Don’t Follow The Same Road

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Hello and Good Day. Hope You have been doing well and Thanks for taking the time to check-in and read my article… always Appreciated!

“We are what we repeatedly do,” (Aristotle)

Retirement is often depicted as a period of leisure and relaxation… however, like any other phase of life, it is comes with its own challenges.

Making the most of our (Encore) years, will continue to require us to examine how we choose to make our decisions. Of course, we weigh our decisions against reason(s) based on how we are feeling at a specific moment in time -and- our decision making process which may rely upon habits.

The person we are now should do things differently than we did when we were influenced by juggling the Family, work, and personal schedules -or- do we fall victim to the same habits, ( *note: if we fall victim to the same, we won’t really change who we are and that is risking a lot of missed opportunities!) 

I am finding it’s easy to allow myself to fall back to Habits… there is a comfort with (still) returning to what I once did – a safety net.

Should we continue with our (old) habits, we might well miss our opportunity to further discover who we are/can be in our Encore years! We are what we do. What we do determines who we can be.

We should have always been cognizant of the bad habits as we were maturing and made the necessary adjustments. However, most times we lost seeing the “forest through the trees” as we had to juggle many aspects of our life -and- many times working within an extremely hectic schedule.

Now, we should be slowing down the need to be all things to everyone! It’s about converting the impediments life presents to us into new opportunities for our action, continued growth and enjoyment of our life!

We have to keep fighting to be the person that we were meant to be!

It’s not that You won’t be busy. You will be. You’ll still be running around like crazy, have a million ideas, a million things You will want to be doing. The problem is that none of them concretely move the ball forward in any way.

In addition, these are difficult and extraordinary times we’re in. Economic, Political, Societal uncertainties. These can be obstacles, setbacks, things that can sink You.

Here’s a quote I came upon some time ago. “Ships don’t sink because of the water around them; ships sink because of the water that get in them. Don’t let what’s happening around You get inside of You and weigh You down.”

What will it be?

Habits answer that question. If we can cultivate our good habits, we can survive, even thrive on what lies ahead. If we relapse and fall to the level of our worst habits, these hard times will only be harder on us.

It’s just time to rethink what getting older is all about. Maybe, we decide to continue growing with a sense of wonder and a deep appreciation for the opportunity to grow more, create more and be more. Consider these steps as You enjoy your days:

– clear our mind

– start small, don’t think big changes

– rejoice in the stillness, release yourself from past and future the future and be fully present and locked in 

We all tell ourselves; “when I have more time, I’ll write my book. When I have more resources, I’ll start my company. When the circumstances are just right, I’ll make a career change. When I get all this other stuff done first, then I’ll be set.”

“Be satisfied with even the smallest progress.” ( Marcus  Aurelius )…  It’s our action by action, step by step, that we will assemble this new phase of  life. 

So while we are blessed in this life with OUR life…use it -and- always remember:

NEVER QUIT SEARCHING, NEVER SETTLE, NEVER GIVE UP SEEKING YOUR GREATER PURPOSE