Originally posted on Facebook HERE
Up way early today. This is where I write and read every morning. That’s the window I usually take a photo out of. Pretty dark out there right now. I’ve been thinking a lot about how our lives reflect what we put into them. And mirrors. What was life like before mirrors? Did people just not care about how they looked? How would you know if you couldn’t see yourself? I think most people look at themselves in a mirror several times a day now. Externally, we see what we see and decide to either live with it, love it, hate, it, do something about it, or just not think about it much at all. Everyone is different. But in our day to day interactions, we often will see our inner selves reflected back to us as well. In my book EVERYBODY DIES I talk about the wheel of life a bit, and it’s briefly mentioned in my first book FEED YOUR ANGEL as well. We all have different categories for our personal wheel of life, but usually spirituality, health, personal growth (education), relationships, work/career, finances and fun/recreation are common threads for everyone. And it’s very hard to keep everything rolling smoothly in every area. Usually there will be areas we’re very invested in and working on more so than others, and categories that will get neglected as a result. There always seems to be an area we’re not doing as well in as we’d like to. So, when that area, whatever it is, starts screaming at us for attention – well, we need to take notice. If you quit your job to go on a spiritual quest, that’s all fine and good until you run out of money. If you focus all your time on making money and running your business, you could be very successful, but maybe your relationships, health and spirituality could suffer. I don’t know if I’ve ever had them all in balance, and the areas we focus on are constantly changing as well. When I start to have an issue in any area, though – I first look at myself to see what I did to cause it and what can I do to make it better. Usually has to do with over focusing one aspect of life that creates a deficit in another. Very hard to get away from that, but if the area that’s being overlooked starts to create strife and tension, priorities need to be re-examined. And as the overlooked area gets more attention, there will be less attention paid somewhere else which eventually could cause a deficit there, and we do it all over again. I’m a very focused and driven individual, so when I decide to make a change – as I did several months ago regarding my health – I get pretty obsessive about it. I spend a lot of time on personal growth, health and spirituality. And as a result, other areas get overlooked. Like fun/recreation for example. And the odd thing about that is this: by overlooking fun and recreation, as well as other areas, even though I’m spending all that time on personal growth, health and spirituality – am I as happy as I would be if I had also included a bit more time to relax a little, or spend more time with my family? Whenever life screams at me that there’s an area that needs attention, I look at it as a mirror to my soul. What did I do to create this? What can I do to make it better? Maybe someday they’ll all work in harmony, but my experience so far is that so much of life works like tides in the ocean, waves, back and forth, it all will pass, we do what we can through hurricanes and calm waters and if there’s anything that isn’t serving us well, look for what we can do to make it better. We can only control our own thoughts, feelings, emotions and responses to any situation. Life will mirror back to us what we are putting into it.
