Standing on the Precipice
“When confronted with these moments, we need to have the courage to go with our gut. To go against the grain and do what feels right, even if it scares us.”
Category: Monday Morning
Conforming to Consensus
“One of the greatest obstacles we will face in this life is summoning the courage to be different from the majority and speak our truth. If we’re being truly honest, a lot of the world doesn’t make sense. Over history, it is precisely those who have bravely stood against the status quo and made critical remarks who have shaped the world for the better.”
Losing Sight and Shifting Focus
“The realization we need to come to is that our happiness and fulfillment cannot exist and be contingent on the achievement of goals. This is because reaching a goal never gives the same satisfaction that we thought it would, but also because it can be an incredibly slow process of getting to those goals, and a process that happens to be ultra susceptible to external influence.”
Making Room for Less
“When we look to first subtract commitments and habits from our lives, we rediscover what we truly value. And by subtracting, we can reassess the validity of the practices we once esteemed so highly. In doing this, at minimum, we will come to appreciate the day-to-day more. At best, it will change everything.”
Avoiding Affirmation
“Living within a positive feedback loop rarely gets us to where we really want to be. At the surface we may appear to be put-together and competent in the tasks we choose to attack in the public eye, but our grand aspirations never get a chance to really be put to the test.”
Don’t Sweat the Small Stuff
“The more we practice this, the less emotionally reactive we become to the big, important events in life. And ultimately, the more we are able to show our care for each other.”
Don’t Let Them Know You’re Hurting
“On the other hand, this advice, as with anything taken to the extreme, can be incredibly limiting, and even self-sabotaging. The game becomes dangerous when people only see one pathway: don’t let them know you’re hurting. There is little danger in a balanced approach to this philosophy, as people then have a default mechanism for when things spiral out of control or the burden becomes too great. Many people, however, end up convincing themselves that this method is the only method. That exposing even the smallest weakness or insecurity would not only change the perceptions that other people have of them, but could even become so detrimental that it would lead to a complete and irreversible loss of identity.”
This is What We Live For
“Amidst all the chaos and pandemonium, peace remains beneath it all, waiting to be discovered. Take a breath and feel what it means to be alive. Cherise this moment as if it is your last. The worries that pull you down and all anxieties for the future hold no power if you focus on this one, precious moment.”
The Joy of Transience
“The tragedy arises when we lose ourselves. When we get absorbed in the larger wave and feel like we have no control. Fighting and thrashing, we desperately seek to reclaim our autonomy. Metaphorically, we look to smooth the ripple with our hand, not realizing that, left to its own nature, everything will be as it should.”
Letting Go on the Ride of Life
As much as points in our life can cause us to carry negative emotions and pain with us long after the event has subsided, the low points should hold just as important a place as the high ones. Why? Because without knowing bad, we can’t know good. Good becomes the new normal, and great becomes the new good. We are always in need of something to compare to.