How to Live a Good Life: Soulful Stories, Surprising Science, and Practical Wisdom
It's time again for an update on the Soul Blazers (or as Kevin calls it Sydney's) Book Club! This time around we read Jonathan Field's How to Live a Good Life: Soulful Stores, Surprising Science, and Practical Wisdom.
This intro took me SO long to read. I've been going through a big shift at work and cutting lunch breaks short and it took me over a week to get through. Bad move Sydney. They key to letting down my defenses and staying open to new personal development methods is to give myself the time to dig in right from the beginning. Once I did however, I greatly enjoyed this book and it's teachings. Both old and new to me.
Let's get into it!
The Good Life Buckets
- Vitality: "None of the other stuff is going to work if the animal that you live in is just a broke-down mess." - Elizabeth Gilbert
- Vitality is an optimal state of body and mind...Notice that vitality isn't just about our bodies. It's about our minds. Why is that? Because in truth, there is no distinction. Your mind and body serve as seamless feedback mechanisms, chemically and electrically.
- Connection: "There is nothing I would not do for those who are really my friends. I have no notion of loving people by halves, it is not my nature." - Jane Austen, Northanger Abbey
- Our Connection Bucket is about nourishing relationships. It's about intimate partners, family, close friends, colleagues, coconspirators, and like-minded community. It's about love and lust, how well we know and relation to ourselves.
- Contribution: "Imagine immensities. Pick yourself up from rejection and plow ahead. Don't compromise. Start now. Start now, every single day." - Debbie Millman
- Your Contribution Bucket is about how you bring your gifts to the world. It's the answer to the poet Mary Oliver's gorgeous question, "Tell, me, what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?" It's about contributing to the world, even if that world is a single person, in a way that is meaningful, in a way that matters and allows you to feel like you matter.
How to Fill Your Good Life Buckets:
- Remember, the snapshit is just a freeze-frame. It is not a judgement about where we've been or how we got here. Our job, now, is not to judge what broght us to this place, but to own where we are and used this new set of tools to make different decisions, take different actions, and plot a course to the best life we're capable of living.
- Live yo' best life!!
Vitality Bucket:
Day 1: Wake Up
- In an odd oriony, most of us spend our lives in the mindless pursuit of a state we've chosen to abondon and can return to at will.
- We're all mad here.
- Awareness is the seed of more aligned being and doing, which is why we explore it on Day one.
After reading this first chapter, I'm pumped. I've got my Breathe App queued back up and I'm ready to roll. I find myself resistant to a 5 minute morning meditation, because I already do a morning yoga practice, but how can 5 more minutes hurt me? So I'm going to add it this week and see how I do.
Day 2: Make Exercise More Fun than Sex
- At the same time, the science is crystal clear. If we want to live good lives, we need to move our bodies.
- I could not agree more.
- Our job today is to turn exercise back into play. To change repetition and boredom into novelty and engagement. To turn isolation and intimidation into friendship and belonging. To turn forced participation and futility into craved activing and tranformative results.
- Whatever it is that makes you want to do more, find it, then do it.
- https://yogawithadriene.com
- Exercise and movement. There are perhaps no better therapies for nearly everything that ails us. These two elixirs are powerful Vitality Bucket fillers.
I'm really not into overhyped chapter titles like this, but I enjoyed it's contents. I've been building an at home yoga practice over the last two years and it's added so much to my life. In January 2018 I committed to 365 days of yoga and as of now, at the tail end of July, I've only missed three days. I really connect with, "Whatever it is that makes you want to do more, find it, then do it." I hated going to the gym, I haded having to plan to workout, so I found an online yoga community. I roll out of bed every morning, grab a drink of water, and I'm on my mat before I can come up with a reason not to be. It's awesome.
Day 3: Snooze to Live
- What stops us from falling back to sleep isn't that we can't sleep. It's the anxiety story we make up that says, "This is wrong, I'm supposed to sleep eight straight hours, I'll never sleep again."
- "Anxiety story," I love that phrase.
I can totally relate to this chapter right now, as I'm struggling through a week of poor sleep. On an average day I meet 7/10 of the sleep hygene basics. I've been making a MUCH stronger effort lately to cut off phone time in bed as well. My problem this week, I believe, is alcohol consumption. I've had a lot of eventig social events where I've had one or two cocktails and that's deeply effecting the quality of my sleep. Also effecting me is the "anxiety story" concept. Worrying about not getting sleep before I even go to sleep. This is definitely something to work on for me.
Day 4: Take a Green Day
Over the last month I've made a Green smoothie a part of my normal routine. Primarilly because it's just too hot in Missouri to eat a hot breakfast, and also as a way to get more fruits, veggies, and protein. I've really enjoyed the practice and have been plesantly surprised by how long it keeps me full. I also find I don't crave coffee as much, or at all, when I start my day with a smoothie. YUM!
Day 5: Get Your Gratitude On
- We are wired to focus on the sucky side of life. Scientists call it the negativity bias.
- From the outside lookin in, we're living awesome lives nad everyting seems to be going right. But from the inside looking out, all we see are the stumbles or negative experiences.
- Why are we so unkind to ourselves?
- Seligman realized that often negativity came from an inability to see and be greatful for what was right in life.
Gratitude is such an important practice! I'm so pleased to see it included as part of the Vitality bucket. Ironically enough, I was just having a conversation about Gratitude, or Positivity, journals yesterday. Clearly, the universe is trying to influence me to pick this practice back up.
Day 6: Dance Like Nobody's Watching (Because they're Not)
- That's when it dawned on me. You can't just choose to be joyful.
- Before you can choose joy, you have to choose you.
- GOD, YES!
I've been having a lot of conversations lately about choosing to be joyful, or happy, even when your circumstances don't dictate that you should. And as Fields points out here (as if he were reading my mind) is that you have to accept yourself, for who you truly are, before you can start the delicate work of finding Joy. I think that's such an important distinction, especially for those struggling to find the good, the ones to whom positive thought seems almost insurmountable. Good doesn't magically happen, it's work, and the work starts at home.
Who would I be if I could be 100% authentically myself all the time? I would walk around with my head held high, incredibly dressed, with a smile on my face, fueled by the power of red lipstick. I would not worry about feeling safe enough to express my feelings or opinions, I would do so matter of factly, with the passion of my truth and convictions. I would not emotionally eat or drink, but rather fill my body with fuel that made it feel good. I would be on a constant journey of personal exploration and development, filling my cup with new ideas so that I may give freely to others. To put it simply, I would shine.
Day 7: Own the Unknown
- Life's greatest moments live in the space between desier and attainment. It's ot the getting that makes life good, it's the seeking, even when that seeking demands not just action but surrender. The moment your object of desire becomes a foregone conclusion, the quest loses its potentioal to change you. Your life becomes a series of reruns, and that gets old fast.
- Without uncertainty, there is no possibility. We end up living not in "the arena," as Teddy Roosevelt describes, but in "the gray twilight that knows neither victory nor defeat."
- Anyone who knows me knows I love a well placed TR quote.
- How do they live in the unknown long enough to do amazing things, tell gorgeous stories, and craft lives of deep meaning and impact?
- Some do. Others self-medicate with everything from drugs to shopping, but it turns out there is another way. You can train yourself to find grace in the space. To cultivate the ease needed to first survive and then thrive as you move through the abyss and into the ectraordinary. To not die a death of a thousand doubts along the way.
- Three words: mindfulness, movement, and story.
- Mindfulness teaches you to zoom the lens out so you're able to more easily identify when you're spinning doom and gloom, and then do one simple thing. Let it go.
- The angst and anxiety that often accompany action in the face of uncertaity can be greatly diminished by regular, intense exercise. Move your body, ease you mind.
- We need a way to hit pause, then consider a different story. One fueled by possbility rather than defeat.
- Mindfulness lets us recognize the spin cycle and begin to pull out. Movement resets our brains, allowing for a more optimisteic state to reign. Then it's up to us to envision the story of success as vividly as we've spun the story of failure.
So much of this chapter resonates for me. In fact, the unknown of how this post might be received is keeping me from being fully open in this moment. I am choosing my words with more care than usual and actively censoring what I share. But, here goes! "What do I love to do or create or have that I'm not pursuing because it's not a sure thing?" Essentials With Syd. I deeply want to form a community of people here who I can share my knowledge and passion with for Young Living and for feeling good. I want to be seen, I want to be heard. But I've been shut down in the past and it's been difficult for me to get back up. "What would my life look and feel like, how would it be materially different, if I got what I wanted?" I imagine, new friends, connections, and yes, financial success. Because financial wellness is equally important as physical wellness.
The craziest part is, my tools are already in place. I have a strong mindfulness and physical practice. All I need to do is re-focus them and put them into action.
Day 8: Take a Forrest Bath
I'm happy to get some concrete, scientific research to back up the blissfull, clear, connected feelings I alwasy have after spending time in quiet solitude with nature. It's something I make a point to do when away from home, but I wish I did more in my everyday life. New life goals!
Day 9: Unfix Your Mind
- "Fixed Midset," the belief that success is powered by some inborn talent that has a natural cap.
- It's an opportunity for you to do deeper, try harder, do something different, ask for help, innovate and learn. So you do.
- That lense..."growth mindset," combined with the effort it fuels, leads to growth rather than defeat in the face of adversity.
- "The path to a growth mindset is a journey, not a proclamation." Do the work, but give it time.
- Think about every opportunity to do something you can't yet do, to learn something you don't yet know as a gift. A success catalyst.
-Woah. Yes. Love that idea.
- Remember, the thing you strive for isn't perfection; it's not the easy win or the advoidance of failure. It's the gift of growth, the opportunity for evolution. Life in a box is not life well lived.
In my previous career I struggled so much, SO much, with Fixed vs. Growth Mindset. Woah! But it was my commitment to leaning into the growth mindset, the classes, the working, the self-reflection, the sweat, that allowed me to finally walk away from that life at peace. If I had stuck to a fixed mindset I'd have walked away feeling all, "It's not my fault. It's out of my countrol. I did what a could." And that is SO not productive or sexy.
Day 10: Take the Slow Lane
- Simple truth: Fast and busy are a choice.
- "Much of my effort apparently wasn't effort at all, but just ineffective stress added on top of something to make it feel like I'm doing the best I can."
- Most important, remember, with the rarest of exceptions, speed and busyness are choices. If you don't like the way they feel, choose differently.
Yes. Preach. Read my in depth thoughts here.
Connection Bucket:
Day 1: Discover Your Socail Set Point
YES to this chapter. I struggled with my social persuasion for so long, only accepting that I was an introvert a few years ago. What a difference that made. I could feel myself opening up more and more to this process as I read this chapter. I felt like, "Yeah, this guy gets me. He's not going to force me to do anything outside my nature." What a relief.
Day 2: Find Your People
- Belonging begins with safety. There needs to be an understanding, either explicit or strongly implied, that this is a place and a relationship where you feel safe enough to be the real you. Where you can deop the facade and be seen, heard, felt, and embraced without judgement or demand for change. This, in fact, is maybe the sinlge most important thing we focus on when developing programming and experiences for Good Life Project.
- Serve others, but don't live you life through them.
- The question you always need to ask when thinking about belonging to a new group is whether the value of what you're being asked to give up is expontnetially exceeded by what you're going to get in return. If the answer is yes, lean in. If it's no, run like hell.
Yep yep yep! Even as an introvert I need people. But my key to happiness in that is the right people. A couple years ago I cut small talk out of my repertoire almost entirely. When someone asks how I'm feeling I really tell them. I talk about what's really going on in my life, and if that scares them, than they're not my people.
Day 3: Cultivate Compassion
- Compassion... is not just an orientation or a stable trait. It's not something we either have or don't have; it is a skill we can learn. Maybe the most surprising outcome, too, is that it took only two weeks.
- Isn't this a relief to learn.
Woah! Compassion is so huge, and it's something I've been working on within myself over the past few years. In a city as cut throat as New York it's difficult to cultivate compassion, but Jonathan is right, it is a practice, a learned skill, and one I know the world could use more of right now. I like the idea of the Loveing Kindness meditation as a way to keep the practice present, to ground it in real life. I hope I can hold on to that tool.
Day 4: Look Up!
- We lose something when we replace real-time contact and breath with asynchronous images and text. That thing, according to Turkle, is empathy. Without it, we lose both the ability to cultivate compassion and the impetus to help others.
- 😱
Yes! A much needed reminder. I am so on board for this 24 hour challenge. I'm planning to meet a friend for Happy Hour after work and, aside from documenting our hangout, I'm going to keep my phone tucked away for the whole time.
Day 5: 60 Minute Love Bomb
I've heard this story on the Modern Love podcast and found it intoxicating. I don't have anyone I think would be appropriate to try out this exploration with right now, but I will absolutely keep it in mind for in the future. What a fun first friend date.
Day 6: Find Your Four Loves
Companionate:
-I have one of my deepest Companionate relationships with my friend John. We went to college together but didn't form a true friendship until years later when we did regional theatre together in Connecticut. He is kind, open-minded, intelligent, and patient. We share a love of American History and politics both of which he's constantly shifting my focus on. Ours is the most balanced platonic friendship I have ever experienced, and it brings me joy every day.
-Colleen and I met when she played my Marmee in a musical in college, but we also formed our true bond years later in NYC. Colleen is blunt, she is honest, she is vivacious, she shines. When I crept out from behind my insecurities and finally saw her for who she truly was it was like coming home. I'm so lucky to know her.
Compassionate:
-I became friends with Rachel kind of on accident. She was childhood friends with my middle school best friend Lucy, and they came as a package deal. My close relationship with Lucy didn't stand the test of time, but Rachel and I have been together ever since. We've seen each other through breakups, divorces, new jobs, giving up dreams, and moving across the country. She is such a stable, reliable, sweet presence in my life.
-Chrisena and I had a rather Elizabeth Bennet/Mr. Darcy beginning. She knew what she was about, while I was afraid and judgemental. But she eventually knocked some sense into me and we've been drinking tequila and dancing it out ever since. Chrisena is the friend who pushes me out of my comfort zone, but who I know will be there with me 100% of the way.
Attachment:
-Mom: I mean, she's mom. We haven't always gotten along, or seen eye to eye (who does with their mothers?) but, when shit hits the fan, she's the one I want to call. And she's always there.
Romantic:
- After knowing each other for 10 years, Jerico reached out to me at a time I needed it most. He knew what I was going through so he listened, he offered advice, he saw me. And more importantly, he was patient enough wait for me to see him too. And thank God I did. He is kind, loving, silly, and has taken on my #1 guilty pleasure The Bachelor. What more could a girl ask for?
Day 7: What's Your Love Language?
I love this quiz. I took it a few years ago and it gave me SUCH insight into both myself and those around me. I re-took it today and here's my results.
Quality Time: 10
Words of Affirmation: 8
Acts of Service: 7
Physical Touch: 4
Gifts: 1
The thing I take issue with here, is that the above scores only show how I like to receive love. Gifts is my personal lowest score, but I know it's right up there with Acts of Service as my highest ways of expressing love to others. Anyone else have that problem?
Day 8: Dial Into Source
I connect dialing into my Source most with moments of Presence and other-worldliness. Especially while traveling and out of my normal environment. Standing in drizzle at Stonehenge. Walking by the Clan markers at Culloden Moore. Driving down high street with a cotton candy sky behind the Capitol. On a great day, I get a glimpse during my morning yoga or meditation. But a taste is enough to keep me going, to keep exploring, to keep growing.
Day 9: Vanquish the Vampires.
- Have you every been in a room with an energy vampire? You walk in and immediately know something is a bit off. No worries; you're an optimist. It'll work itself out. So you begin a conversation. And then you feel it. In every moment, with every word, you feel a little more of your soul being sucked out of your body. Minutes or, if it's been a full-on assault, hours or perhaps even days later, you're left an empty husk. You, my friend, have just been sucked dry by an energy vampire.
- !!!
- What if we approached these people from a place of compassion? If, instead of saying, "What an idot," we asked, "What must she be suffering to need so desperately?" Compassion changed our views on life-sucking behaviour. That doesn't mean you just relent and submit. Compassion is just a starting point.
- Find or deepen other relationships that have the exact opposite effect on you. Ones that lift you. Ones that give you more than you could ever give back. Ones that leave you feeling like you've just had a life-force tranfusion. I call relationships that serve this role your energy beacons. Having them in your life is critically important. They fill your Connection and Vitality Buckets.
My oh my is the world full of energy vampires, and I know a lot of them. Like Jonathan points out, I try and focus on Compassion, hear them out, and then up the self-care to recover. Sometimes I feel like that's all you can do.
Day 10: Uncage Your Conversation
- I realized my biggest barrier now was no longer a lack of skills; it was my dated definition of myself as an inept conversationalist. It was time to start shaking free of that.
- Imagine how free we would all feel if we stopped narrowly defining ourselves and let our light shine through?! Also, "dated definition," love that phrasing.
- Mindset is key. Cultivating a mindfulness practice has given me the sense of awareness needed to better understand what's really happening in any given conversation.
- My mindfulness practice is so important to me. It pings my brain several times a day bringing me back to reality and what's important to me.
Contribution Bucket:
Day 1: Spark Yourself
- What if you don't so much have a passion or purpose as much as you pursue something, or a bunch of things, with passion and a sense of purpose?
- What if it isn't so much about having to find that ever-elusive solitary passion or purpose, but rather finding a way to speak your interest in something that increasingly pulls you from ahead, the deeper you wade into it? With purpose.
- Curiosity sparks often come in the form of a burning question, a deep yearning to discover an answer to a problem that, for some reason you may or may not understand, you feel compelled to solve.
- Fascination Sparks: You feel like you're wired to be interested in it, and given the opportunity, you'd even pay and devote your most precious asset - time - to learn about it.
- Hello Essential Oils!
- Immersion Sparks are generally triggered by activities that make you want to do more, regardless of the outcome and without any quest beyond the simple desire to enjoy what you're doing.
- My presidential history obsession fits in nicely here. :)
- Mastery Sparks: They are about working fiercely at something not only because you love to do it, but because you are drawn to achieve a level of mastery. It's not just about doing it; it's about getting good at it.
- So when you find yourself in the grip of a mastery spark on a quest to be the world's best, stop regularly on the way. Recognize the sacrifice that this level of achievement will almost always require, and make a deliberate decision about what you're willing to give up in the name of mastery.
-WOAH was this the story with me and theatre.
- Service Sparks: This is the fire that is lit when you think about serving or helping or in some way giving yourself to a particular person, group, or being. This spark is often bundled with others.
I'm so into the idea of not letting one interest or passion define you but persuing your interests with passion and purpose. Praise be! I could talk about this all day long.
Day 2: Know What Matters
- Thing is, we can't make good decisions until we know what matters to us. Until we have some sense of what's important, what we believe, what we value. When we know these things, decisions get easier. Something's either aligned with our values and beliefs, or it's not. If it's aligned, it's a yes. If not, it's a no. If we have two options, both well aligned, we choose the one that's a better fit.
- The more I think about it, the more it seems we don't really have a decision-making crisis. We have a self-knowledge crisis.
- Ah-ha!
- Good decisions don't come from self-delusion. They come from ruthless self-knowledge, brutal honesty.
I like the process this exercise walks you through to define your values. It reminds me a lot of Danielle LaPorte's prcocess for defining your Core Desired Feelings. I have a good feeling of what my values are, the essence of them, but I found it next to impossible to actually go through this exercise. Of course, we don't live in a world of moral absolutes, so I know there will be some grey area for me, but I think I'm more wired to live based on how I want to feel (which is constantly fluctuating) than by any hard and fast ideals. Notice how many times I used "feelings" in that paragraph. 😐
Day 3: Tap Your Strengths
- Rather than working entirely on the job of fixing what's wrong in our life... if we understand our strengths, then build as much of our life as possible around them, much of what's wrong seems to fall away.
Oh, I am so one of those people who spent years hiding my strenths under a bushell and fruitlessly trying to construct a fortress on the shaky foundation of skills I did not posess. With time, I've come to trust my strenghts more and more and, I'll tell you, I've never regreted it.
My VIA Survey Scores: I have to say, I'm proud of these results.
1. Love of Learning: Mastering new skills, topics, and bodies of knowledge, whether on one's own or formally; related to the strength of curiosity but goes beyond it to describe the tendency to add systematically to what one knows.
2. Judgement: Thinking things through and examining them from all sides; not jumping to conclusions; being able to change one's mind in light of evidence; weighing all evidence fairly.
3. Appreciation of Beauty & Excellence: Noticing and appreciating beauty, excellence, and/orskilled performance in various domains of life, from nature to art to mathematics to science to everyday experience.
4. Kindness: Doing favors and good deeds for others; helping them; taking care of them.
5. Love: Valuing close relations with others, in particular those in which sharing & caring are reciprocated; being close to people.
6. Gratitude: Being aware of and thankful for the good things that happen; taking time to express thanks.
Day 4: Find Your Killer App
- When you contribute to the world in a way that taps your killer app, something kind of magical can happen. Competence becomes confidence. That feeling of radiant ease. Like you're doing something you're truly extraordinary at.
Throughout all of the personal development I've done over the last few years I've determined that my Killer App lies in writing. Diving deep into my experiences, my feelings, and typing away at them to reveal their deeper meaning. It's how I contribute to my self-relationship, my relationship with others via pen pals, and my community through jeffcityblog.com.
Day 5: Get Out of Your Head
- You may even think you've come to a "logical" conclusion and kill it, but in fact, if you've never done anything to take the idea from your head into the world, there's a good chance the decision is more about fear than logic.
- The greatest stories ever told weren't great because they were thought. They were great because they were expressed.
- I love this.
- When you share an idea, it becomes real. So does the possibility of failure and judgment. We'd do pretty much anything to avoid that, including destroying the opportunity for success.
Hi, my name is Sydney and I am a member of the In Your Head club. I'm a lot better than I used to be, but I spent most of my time as an Actor in my head, talking myself in circles and out of success. And guess what? It SUCKED! Not only was I punishing myself with bad self-talk, I was debilitating myself from stepping into a better situation. Keeping up with this blog is something I regularly let fear talk me out of, though I'm happy to say I've put fear in its box and I'm on an upswing. I guess that's my one little step for today, admitting that when I drop off the face of the internet for months at a time it's largely because fear as sapped me dry and I'm trying to pry my way out.
Day 6: Woop It Up
My current personal WOOP:
Wish - I want to perform at Melissa and Kyle's Wedding.
Outcome - I want to feel empowered by it. I want to give my love to them.
Obstacle - The expectations of my friends. Confusing the narrative I've put out, going back on my word.
Plan - Practice. Let John support me, speak my truth, and speak from the heart.
Day 7: Give to Glow
- "If you are selfless to the point of self-sacrifice, at some point you run out of energy and resources to be able to contribute to others Whereas people who are able to work toward their own goals, or at least keep their own interests in their rearview mirror when they're helping others, are able to sustain their energy and their resources, and that allows them to give much more over time."
- I believe serving others starts with serving yourself.
Day 8: Practice the Loving No
- At a certain point, the answer is not efficiency; it's subtraction.
- Oh HELL yes!
- If the magic that draws others to want it from you is so fleeting or illusory that making it harder to get quickly renders it obsolete, then you don't have something worth worrying about.
- What if that person does hate you for it? If it's someone not central to your life, it's probably a good thing you learned how they respond to boundaries before they become central. And if it is someone central, then maybe it's a great time to begin the process of defining better boundaries for both you and that person.
- It's great to feel valued, and I'd love to be able to make everyone happy. But at the same time, I need a pretty big chunk of time to make real progress in the work that is most meaningful to me, and to honor my commitment to be present with my family and do the things needed fill my Vitality Bucket. Much as it pains me to say no, I have to. And so do you. Because if we don't, everything suffers.
- I'll say again, I believe serving others starts with serving yourself.
Day 9: Love the Job Your With
- The only truth when you're doing life-sucking work is that it's sucking your life.
- And when mamma ain't happy, ain't nobody happy.
- The idea that something beyond pure circumstances determines our experience of work and life. The possibility that we might derive profound meaning from our work not by changing the work, but by changing the way we look at it.
- Perspective is everything. Everything.
I enjoy the work I do Monday - Friday, but it's my outside creative efforts and other endeavors that keep me moving forward and get me out of bed in the morning. Which, in turn, feeds my creativity and positivity at the office, and on and on.
Day 10: Think Ripple, Not Wave
- We are all capable of contributing to the world in a way that makes a profound difference.
- But most of us, myself included, take a different yet equally valid path. It's the path of the ripple. Simple actions, moments, and experiences. Created, offered, and delivered with such a purity of intention and depth of integrity and clarity that they set in motion a ripple that, quietly, in its own way, in its own time, expands outward. Interacting with, touching, mattering to people we've never met in ways we never conceived.
- Be the turtle, not the hare.
- You can apply the idea of ripple to the way you contribute to the world.
Moving slow, moving intentionally, and having the luxury of the time and space to do so has been my biggest quality of life change over the last few years. If you have the opportunity to make this shift, take it, breathe it in, and don't let go.
For our group discussion we came from three distinctly different places. Molly's been living with these ideas for about a year and used this read-through as a refresher. Kevin read it a little before I did and jumped on the My Good Life Journal bandwagon, going all in. I, as usual, took a slower and more deeply thoughtful approach serving as the pace car of the group. As I was so focused and turned inward during this process it was refreshing to hear from Molly's experience and Kevin's enthusiasm.
So where did we land? Gratitude always. Be grateful, be present, do only what speaks to you. Stay in the lifestyle and don't forget your toolbox.
I realized, as I was compiling my throughs for this piece that the phrase, "I'm/I've been working on this," comes up a lot. This was revealing to me and made me proud of the active, consious role I've chosen to take in my life. How awake I've become to the work I, one tiny person, can do to better my life and the lives of those around me.
So rather than blowing my mind with a ton of new ideas, this book helped me move along a road of thought I was already headed down and gave me some tools to assist my journey. And I got to share and grow with two of my truest friends. What a gift that is. - xo Sydney
This intro took me SO long to read. I've been going through a big shift at work and cutting lunch breaks short and it took me over a week to get through. Bad move Sydney. They key to letting down my defenses and staying open to new personal development methods is to give myself the time to dig in right from the beginning. Once I did however, I greatly enjoyed this book and it's teachings. Both old and new to me.
Let's get into it!
- Vitality: "None of the other stuff is going to work if the animal that you live in is just a broke-down mess." - Elizabeth Gilbert
- Vitality is an optimal state of body and mind...Notice that vitality isn't just about our bodies. It's about our minds. Why is that? Because in truth, there is no distinction. Your mind and body serve as seamless feedback mechanisms, chemically and electrically.
- Connection: "There is nothing I would not do for those who are really my friends. I have no notion of loving people by halves, it is not my nature." - Jane Austen, Northanger Abbey
- Our Connection Bucket is about nourishing relationships. It's about intimate partners, family, close friends, colleagues, coconspirators, and like-minded community. It's about love and lust, how well we know and relation to ourselves.
- Contribution: "Imagine immensities. Pick yourself up from rejection and plow ahead. Don't compromise. Start now. Start now, every single day." - Debbie Millman
- Your Contribution Bucket is about how you bring your gifts to the world. It's the answer to the poet Mary Oliver's gorgeous question, "Tell, me, what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?" It's about contributing to the world, even if that world is a single person, in a way that is meaningful, in a way that matters and allows you to feel like you matter.
How to Fill Your Good Life Buckets:
- Remember, the snapshit is just a freeze-frame. It is not a judgement about where we've been or how we got here. Our job, now, is not to judge what broght us to this place, but to own where we are and used this new set of tools to make different decisions, take different actions, and plot a course to the best life we're capable of living.
- Live yo' best life!!
Vitality Bucket:
Day 1: Wake Up
- In an odd oriony, most of us spend our lives in the mindless pursuit of a state we've chosen to abondon and can return to at will.
- We're all mad here.
- Awareness is the seed of more aligned being and doing, which is why we explore it on Day one.
After reading this first chapter, I'm pumped. I've got my Breathe App queued back up and I'm ready to roll. I find myself resistant to a 5 minute morning meditation, because I already do a morning yoga practice, but how can 5 more minutes hurt me? So I'm going to add it this week and see how I do.
Day 2: Make Exercise More Fun than Sex
- At the same time, the science is crystal clear. If we want to live good lives, we need to move our bodies.
- I could not agree more.
- Our job today is to turn exercise back into play. To change repetition and boredom into novelty and engagement. To turn isolation and intimidation into friendship and belonging. To turn forced participation and futility into craved activing and tranformative results.
- Whatever it is that makes you want to do more, find it, then do it.
- https://yogawithadriene.com
- Exercise and movement. There are perhaps no better therapies for nearly everything that ails us. These two elixirs are powerful Vitality Bucket fillers.
I'm really not into overhyped chapter titles like this, but I enjoyed it's contents. I've been building an at home yoga practice over the last two years and it's added so much to my life. In January 2018 I committed to 365 days of yoga and as of now, at the tail end of July, I've only missed three days. I really connect with, "Whatever it is that makes you want to do more, find it, then do it." I hated going to the gym, I haded having to plan to workout, so I found an online yoga community. I roll out of bed every morning, grab a drink of water, and I'm on my mat before I can come up with a reason not to be. It's awesome.
Day 3: Snooze to Live
- What stops us from falling back to sleep isn't that we can't sleep. It's the anxiety story we make up that says, "This is wrong, I'm supposed to sleep eight straight hours, I'll never sleep again."
- "Anxiety story," I love that phrase.
I can totally relate to this chapter right now, as I'm struggling through a week of poor sleep. On an average day I meet 7/10 of the sleep hygene basics. I've been making a MUCH stronger effort lately to cut off phone time in bed as well. My problem this week, I believe, is alcohol consumption. I've had a lot of eventig social events where I've had one or two cocktails and that's deeply effecting the quality of my sleep. Also effecting me is the "anxiety story" concept. Worrying about not getting sleep before I even go to sleep. This is definitely something to work on for me.
Day 4: Take a Green Day
Over the last month I've made a Green smoothie a part of my normal routine. Primarilly because it's just too hot in Missouri to eat a hot breakfast, and also as a way to get more fruits, veggies, and protein. I've really enjoyed the practice and have been plesantly surprised by how long it keeps me full. I also find I don't crave coffee as much, or at all, when I start my day with a smoothie. YUM!
Day 5: Get Your Gratitude On
- We are wired to focus on the sucky side of life. Scientists call it the negativity bias.
- From the outside lookin in, we're living awesome lives nad everyting seems to be going right. But from the inside looking out, all we see are the stumbles or negative experiences.
- Why are we so unkind to ourselves?
- Seligman realized that often negativity came from an inability to see and be greatful for what was right in life.
Gratitude is such an important practice! I'm so pleased to see it included as part of the Vitality bucket. Ironically enough, I was just having a conversation about Gratitude, or Positivity, journals yesterday. Clearly, the universe is trying to influence me to pick this practice back up.
Day 6: Dance Like Nobody's Watching (Because they're Not)
- That's when it dawned on me. You can't just choose to be joyful.
- Before you can choose joy, you have to choose you.
- GOD, YES!
I've been having a lot of conversations lately about choosing to be joyful, or happy, even when your circumstances don't dictate that you should. And as Fields points out here (as if he were reading my mind) is that you have to accept yourself, for who you truly are, before you can start the delicate work of finding Joy. I think that's such an important distinction, especially for those struggling to find the good, the ones to whom positive thought seems almost insurmountable. Good doesn't magically happen, it's work, and the work starts at home.
Who would I be if I could be 100% authentically myself all the time? I would walk around with my head held high, incredibly dressed, with a smile on my face, fueled by the power of red lipstick. I would not worry about feeling safe enough to express my feelings or opinions, I would do so matter of factly, with the passion of my truth and convictions. I would not emotionally eat or drink, but rather fill my body with fuel that made it feel good. I would be on a constant journey of personal exploration and development, filling my cup with new ideas so that I may give freely to others. To put it simply, I would shine.
Day 7: Own the Unknown
- Life's greatest moments live in the space between desier and attainment. It's ot the getting that makes life good, it's the seeking, even when that seeking demands not just action but surrender. The moment your object of desire becomes a foregone conclusion, the quest loses its potentioal to change you. Your life becomes a series of reruns, and that gets old fast.
- Without uncertainty, there is no possibility. We end up living not in "the arena," as Teddy Roosevelt describes, but in "the gray twilight that knows neither victory nor defeat."
- Anyone who knows me knows I love a well placed TR quote.
- How do they live in the unknown long enough to do amazing things, tell gorgeous stories, and craft lives of deep meaning and impact?
- Some do. Others self-medicate with everything from drugs to shopping, but it turns out there is another way. You can train yourself to find grace in the space. To cultivate the ease needed to first survive and then thrive as you move through the abyss and into the ectraordinary. To not die a death of a thousand doubts along the way.
- Three words: mindfulness, movement, and story.
- Mindfulness teaches you to zoom the lens out so you're able to more easily identify when you're spinning doom and gloom, and then do one simple thing. Let it go.
- The angst and anxiety that often accompany action in the face of uncertaity can be greatly diminished by regular, intense exercise. Move your body, ease you mind.
- We need a way to hit pause, then consider a different story. One fueled by possbility rather than defeat.
- Mindfulness lets us recognize the spin cycle and begin to pull out. Movement resets our brains, allowing for a more optimisteic state to reign. Then it's up to us to envision the story of success as vividly as we've spun the story of failure.
So much of this chapter resonates for me. In fact, the unknown of how this post might be received is keeping me from being fully open in this moment. I am choosing my words with more care than usual and actively censoring what I share. But, here goes! "What do I love to do or create or have that I'm not pursuing because it's not a sure thing?" Essentials With Syd. I deeply want to form a community of people here who I can share my knowledge and passion with for Young Living and for feeling good. I want to be seen, I want to be heard. But I've been shut down in the past and it's been difficult for me to get back up. "What would my life look and feel like, how would it be materially different, if I got what I wanted?" I imagine, new friends, connections, and yes, financial success. Because financial wellness is equally important as physical wellness.
The craziest part is, my tools are already in place. I have a strong mindfulness and physical practice. All I need to do is re-focus them and put them into action.
Day 8: Take a Forrest Bath
I'm happy to get some concrete, scientific research to back up the blissfull, clear, connected feelings I alwasy have after spending time in quiet solitude with nature. It's something I make a point to do when away from home, but I wish I did more in my everyday life. New life goals!
Day 9: Unfix Your Mind
- "Fixed Midset," the belief that success is powered by some inborn talent that has a natural cap.
- It's an opportunity for you to do deeper, try harder, do something different, ask for help, innovate and learn. So you do.
- That lense..."growth mindset," combined with the effort it fuels, leads to growth rather than defeat in the face of adversity.
- "The path to a growth mindset is a journey, not a proclamation." Do the work, but give it time.
- Think about every opportunity to do something you can't yet do, to learn something you don't yet know as a gift. A success catalyst.
-Woah. Yes. Love that idea.
- Remember, the thing you strive for isn't perfection; it's not the easy win or the advoidance of failure. It's the gift of growth, the opportunity for evolution. Life in a box is not life well lived.
In my previous career I struggled so much, SO much, with Fixed vs. Growth Mindset. Woah! But it was my commitment to leaning into the growth mindset, the classes, the working, the self-reflection, the sweat, that allowed me to finally walk away from that life at peace. If I had stuck to a fixed mindset I'd have walked away feeling all, "It's not my fault. It's out of my countrol. I did what a could." And that is SO not productive or sexy.
Day 10: Take the Slow Lane
- Simple truth: Fast and busy are a choice.
- "Much of my effort apparently wasn't effort at all, but just ineffective stress added on top of something to make it feel like I'm doing the best I can."
- Most important, remember, with the rarest of exceptions, speed and busyness are choices. If you don't like the way they feel, choose differently.
Yes. Preach. Read my in depth thoughts here.
Connection Bucket:
Day 1: Discover Your Socail Set Point
YES to this chapter. I struggled with my social persuasion for so long, only accepting that I was an introvert a few years ago. What a difference that made. I could feel myself opening up more and more to this process as I read this chapter. I felt like, "Yeah, this guy gets me. He's not going to force me to do anything outside my nature." What a relief.
Day 2: Find Your People
- Belonging begins with safety. There needs to be an understanding, either explicit or strongly implied, that this is a place and a relationship where you feel safe enough to be the real you. Where you can deop the facade and be seen, heard, felt, and embraced without judgement or demand for change. This, in fact, is maybe the sinlge most important thing we focus on when developing programming and experiences for Good Life Project.
- Serve others, but don't live you life through them.
- The question you always need to ask when thinking about belonging to a new group is whether the value of what you're being asked to give up is expontnetially exceeded by what you're going to get in return. If the answer is yes, lean in. If it's no, run like hell.
Yep yep yep! Even as an introvert I need people. But my key to happiness in that is the right people. A couple years ago I cut small talk out of my repertoire almost entirely. When someone asks how I'm feeling I really tell them. I talk about what's really going on in my life, and if that scares them, than they're not my people.
Day 3: Cultivate Compassion
- Compassion... is not just an orientation or a stable trait. It's not something we either have or don't have; it is a skill we can learn. Maybe the most surprising outcome, too, is that it took only two weeks.
- Isn't this a relief to learn.
Woah! Compassion is so huge, and it's something I've been working on within myself over the past few years. In a city as cut throat as New York it's difficult to cultivate compassion, but Jonathan is right, it is a practice, a learned skill, and one I know the world could use more of right now. I like the idea of the Loveing Kindness meditation as a way to keep the practice present, to ground it in real life. I hope I can hold on to that tool.
Day 4: Look Up!
- We lose something when we replace real-time contact and breath with asynchronous images and text. That thing, according to Turkle, is empathy. Without it, we lose both the ability to cultivate compassion and the impetus to help others.
- 😱
Yes! A much needed reminder. I am so on board for this 24 hour challenge. I'm planning to meet a friend for Happy Hour after work and, aside from documenting our hangout, I'm going to keep my phone tucked away for the whole time.
Day 5: 60 Minute Love Bomb
I've heard this story on the Modern Love podcast and found it intoxicating. I don't have anyone I think would be appropriate to try out this exploration with right now, but I will absolutely keep it in mind for in the future. What a fun first friend date.
Day 6: Find Your Four Loves
Companionate:
-I have one of my deepest Companionate relationships with my friend John. We went to college together but didn't form a true friendship until years later when we did regional theatre together in Connecticut. He is kind, open-minded, intelligent, and patient. We share a love of American History and politics both of which he's constantly shifting my focus on. Ours is the most balanced platonic friendship I have ever experienced, and it brings me joy every day.
-Colleen and I met when she played my Marmee in a musical in college, but we also formed our true bond years later in NYC. Colleen is blunt, she is honest, she is vivacious, she shines. When I crept out from behind my insecurities and finally saw her for who she truly was it was like coming home. I'm so lucky to know her.
Compassionate:
-I became friends with Rachel kind of on accident. She was childhood friends with my middle school best friend Lucy, and they came as a package deal. My close relationship with Lucy didn't stand the test of time, but Rachel and I have been together ever since. We've seen each other through breakups, divorces, new jobs, giving up dreams, and moving across the country. She is such a stable, reliable, sweet presence in my life.
-Chrisena and I had a rather Elizabeth Bennet/Mr. Darcy beginning. She knew what she was about, while I was afraid and judgemental. But she eventually knocked some sense into me and we've been drinking tequila and dancing it out ever since. Chrisena is the friend who pushes me out of my comfort zone, but who I know will be there with me 100% of the way.
Attachment:
-Mom: I mean, she's mom. We haven't always gotten along, or seen eye to eye (who does with their mothers?) but, when shit hits the fan, she's the one I want to call. And she's always there.
Romantic:
- After knowing each other for 10 years, Jerico reached out to me at a time I needed it most. He knew what I was going through so he listened, he offered advice, he saw me. And more importantly, he was patient enough wait for me to see him too. And thank God I did. He is kind, loving, silly, and has taken on my #1 guilty pleasure The Bachelor. What more could a girl ask for?
Day 7: What's Your Love Language?
I love this quiz. I took it a few years ago and it gave me SUCH insight into both myself and those around me. I re-took it today and here's my results.
Quality Time: 10
Words of Affirmation: 8
Acts of Service: 7
Physical Touch: 4
Gifts: 1
The thing I take issue with here, is that the above scores only show how I like to receive love. Gifts is my personal lowest score, but I know it's right up there with Acts of Service as my highest ways of expressing love to others. Anyone else have that problem?
Day 8: Dial Into Source
I connect dialing into my Source most with moments of Presence and other-worldliness. Especially while traveling and out of my normal environment. Standing in drizzle at Stonehenge. Walking by the Clan markers at Culloden Moore. Driving down high street with a cotton candy sky behind the Capitol. On a great day, I get a glimpse during my morning yoga or meditation. But a taste is enough to keep me going, to keep exploring, to keep growing.
Day 9: Vanquish the Vampires.
- Have you every been in a room with an energy vampire? You walk in and immediately know something is a bit off. No worries; you're an optimist. It'll work itself out. So you begin a conversation. And then you feel it. In every moment, with every word, you feel a little more of your soul being sucked out of your body. Minutes or, if it's been a full-on assault, hours or perhaps even days later, you're left an empty husk. You, my friend, have just been sucked dry by an energy vampire.
- !!!
- What if we approached these people from a place of compassion? If, instead of saying, "What an idot," we asked, "What must she be suffering to need so desperately?" Compassion changed our views on life-sucking behaviour. That doesn't mean you just relent and submit. Compassion is just a starting point.
- Find or deepen other relationships that have the exact opposite effect on you. Ones that lift you. Ones that give you more than you could ever give back. Ones that leave you feeling like you've just had a life-force tranfusion. I call relationships that serve this role your energy beacons. Having them in your life is critically important. They fill your Connection and Vitality Buckets.
My oh my is the world full of energy vampires, and I know a lot of them. Like Jonathan points out, I try and focus on Compassion, hear them out, and then up the self-care to recover. Sometimes I feel like that's all you can do.
Day 10: Uncage Your Conversation
- I realized my biggest barrier now was no longer a lack of skills; it was my dated definition of myself as an inept conversationalist. It was time to start shaking free of that.
- Imagine how free we would all feel if we stopped narrowly defining ourselves and let our light shine through?! Also, "dated definition," love that phrasing.
- Mindset is key. Cultivating a mindfulness practice has given me the sense of awareness needed to better understand what's really happening in any given conversation.
- My mindfulness practice is so important to me. It pings my brain several times a day bringing me back to reality and what's important to me.
Contribution Bucket:
Day 1: Spark Yourself
- What if you don't so much have a passion or purpose as much as you pursue something, or a bunch of things, with passion and a sense of purpose?
- What if it isn't so much about having to find that ever-elusive solitary passion or purpose, but rather finding a way to speak your interest in something that increasingly pulls you from ahead, the deeper you wade into it? With purpose.
- Curiosity sparks often come in the form of a burning question, a deep yearning to discover an answer to a problem that, for some reason you may or may not understand, you feel compelled to solve.
- Fascination Sparks: You feel like you're wired to be interested in it, and given the opportunity, you'd even pay and devote your most precious asset - time - to learn about it.
- Hello Essential Oils!
- Immersion Sparks are generally triggered by activities that make you want to do more, regardless of the outcome and without any quest beyond the simple desire to enjoy what you're doing.
- My presidential history obsession fits in nicely here. :)
- Mastery Sparks: They are about working fiercely at something not only because you love to do it, but because you are drawn to achieve a level of mastery. It's not just about doing it; it's about getting good at it.
- So when you find yourself in the grip of a mastery spark on a quest to be the world's best, stop regularly on the way. Recognize the sacrifice that this level of achievement will almost always require, and make a deliberate decision about what you're willing to give up in the name of mastery.
-WOAH was this the story with me and theatre.
- Service Sparks: This is the fire that is lit when you think about serving or helping or in some way giving yourself to a particular person, group, or being. This spark is often bundled with others.
I'm so into the idea of not letting one interest or passion define you but persuing your interests with passion and purpose. Praise be! I could talk about this all day long.
Day 2: Know What Matters
- Thing is, we can't make good decisions until we know what matters to us. Until we have some sense of what's important, what we believe, what we value. When we know these things, decisions get easier. Something's either aligned with our values and beliefs, or it's not. If it's aligned, it's a yes. If not, it's a no. If we have two options, both well aligned, we choose the one that's a better fit.
- The more I think about it, the more it seems we don't really have a decision-making crisis. We have a self-knowledge crisis.
- Ah-ha!
- Good decisions don't come from self-delusion. They come from ruthless self-knowledge, brutal honesty.
I like the process this exercise walks you through to define your values. It reminds me a lot of Danielle LaPorte's prcocess for defining your Core Desired Feelings. I have a good feeling of what my values are, the essence of them, but I found it next to impossible to actually go through this exercise. Of course, we don't live in a world of moral absolutes, so I know there will be some grey area for me, but I think I'm more wired to live based on how I want to feel (which is constantly fluctuating) than by any hard and fast ideals. Notice how many times I used "feelings" in that paragraph. 😐
Day 3: Tap Your Strengths
- Rather than working entirely on the job of fixing what's wrong in our life... if we understand our strengths, then build as much of our life as possible around them, much of what's wrong seems to fall away.
Oh, I am so one of those people who spent years hiding my strenths under a bushell and fruitlessly trying to construct a fortress on the shaky foundation of skills I did not posess. With time, I've come to trust my strenghts more and more and, I'll tell you, I've never regreted it.
My VIA Survey Scores: I have to say, I'm proud of these results.
1. Love of Learning: Mastering new skills, topics, and bodies of knowledge, whether on one's own or formally; related to the strength of curiosity but goes beyond it to describe the tendency to add systematically to what one knows.
2. Judgement: Thinking things through and examining them from all sides; not jumping to conclusions; being able to change one's mind in light of evidence; weighing all evidence fairly.
3. Appreciation of Beauty & Excellence: Noticing and appreciating beauty, excellence, and/orskilled performance in various domains of life, from nature to art to mathematics to science to everyday experience.
4. Kindness: Doing favors and good deeds for others; helping them; taking care of them.
5. Love: Valuing close relations with others, in particular those in which sharing & caring are reciprocated; being close to people.
6. Gratitude: Being aware of and thankful for the good things that happen; taking time to express thanks.
Day 4: Find Your Killer App
- When you contribute to the world in a way that taps your killer app, something kind of magical can happen. Competence becomes confidence. That feeling of radiant ease. Like you're doing something you're truly extraordinary at.
Throughout all of the personal development I've done over the last few years I've determined that my Killer App lies in writing. Diving deep into my experiences, my feelings, and typing away at them to reveal their deeper meaning. It's how I contribute to my self-relationship, my relationship with others via pen pals, and my community through jeffcityblog.com.
Day 5: Get Out of Your Head
- You may even think you've come to a "logical" conclusion and kill it, but in fact, if you've never done anything to take the idea from your head into the world, there's a good chance the decision is more about fear than logic.
- The greatest stories ever told weren't great because they were thought. They were great because they were expressed.
- I love this.
- When you share an idea, it becomes real. So does the possibility of failure and judgment. We'd do pretty much anything to avoid that, including destroying the opportunity for success.
Hi, my name is Sydney and I am a member of the In Your Head club. I'm a lot better than I used to be, but I spent most of my time as an Actor in my head, talking myself in circles and out of success. And guess what? It SUCKED! Not only was I punishing myself with bad self-talk, I was debilitating myself from stepping into a better situation. Keeping up with this blog is something I regularly let fear talk me out of, though I'm happy to say I've put fear in its box and I'm on an upswing. I guess that's my one little step for today, admitting that when I drop off the face of the internet for months at a time it's largely because fear as sapped me dry and I'm trying to pry my way out.
Day 6: Woop It Up
My current personal WOOP:
Wish - I want to perform at Melissa and Kyle's Wedding.
Outcome - I want to feel empowered by it. I want to give my love to them.
Obstacle - The expectations of my friends. Confusing the narrative I've put out, going back on my word.
Plan - Practice. Let John support me, speak my truth, and speak from the heart.
Day 7: Give to Glow
- "If you are selfless to the point of self-sacrifice, at some point you run out of energy and resources to be able to contribute to others Whereas people who are able to work toward their own goals, or at least keep their own interests in their rearview mirror when they're helping others, are able to sustain their energy and their resources, and that allows them to give much more over time."
- I believe serving others starts with serving yourself.
Day 8: Practice the Loving No
- At a certain point, the answer is not efficiency; it's subtraction.
- Oh HELL yes!
- If the magic that draws others to want it from you is so fleeting or illusory that making it harder to get quickly renders it obsolete, then you don't have something worth worrying about.
- What if that person does hate you for it? If it's someone not central to your life, it's probably a good thing you learned how they respond to boundaries before they become central. And if it is someone central, then maybe it's a great time to begin the process of defining better boundaries for both you and that person.
- It's great to feel valued, and I'd love to be able to make everyone happy. But at the same time, I need a pretty big chunk of time to make real progress in the work that is most meaningful to me, and to honor my commitment to be present with my family and do the things needed fill my Vitality Bucket. Much as it pains me to say no, I have to. And so do you. Because if we don't, everything suffers.
- I'll say again, I believe serving others starts with serving yourself.
Day 9: Love the Job Your With
- The only truth when you're doing life-sucking work is that it's sucking your life.
- And when mamma ain't happy, ain't nobody happy.
- The idea that something beyond pure circumstances determines our experience of work and life. The possibility that we might derive profound meaning from our work not by changing the work, but by changing the way we look at it.
- Perspective is everything. Everything.
I enjoy the work I do Monday - Friday, but it's my outside creative efforts and other endeavors that keep me moving forward and get me out of bed in the morning. Which, in turn, feeds my creativity and positivity at the office, and on and on.
Day 10: Think Ripple, Not Wave
- We are all capable of contributing to the world in a way that makes a profound difference.
- But most of us, myself included, take a different yet equally valid path. It's the path of the ripple. Simple actions, moments, and experiences. Created, offered, and delivered with such a purity of intention and depth of integrity and clarity that they set in motion a ripple that, quietly, in its own way, in its own time, expands outward. Interacting with, touching, mattering to people we've never met in ways we never conceived.
- Be the turtle, not the hare.
- You can apply the idea of ripple to the way you contribute to the world.
Moving slow, moving intentionally, and having the luxury of the time and space to do so has been my biggest quality of life change over the last few years. If you have the opportunity to make this shift, take it, breathe it in, and don't let go.
For our group discussion we came from three distinctly different places. Molly's been living with these ideas for about a year and used this read-through as a refresher. Kevin read it a little before I did and jumped on the My Good Life Journal bandwagon, going all in. I, as usual, took a slower and more deeply thoughtful approach serving as the pace car of the group. As I was so focused and turned inward during this process it was refreshing to hear from Molly's experience and Kevin's enthusiasm.
So where did we land? Gratitude always. Be grateful, be present, do only what speaks to you. Stay in the lifestyle and don't forget your toolbox.
I realized, as I was compiling my throughs for this piece that the phrase, "I'm/I've been working on this," comes up a lot. This was revealing to me and made me proud of the active, consious role I've chosen to take in my life. How awake I've become to the work I, one tiny person, can do to better my life and the lives of those around me.
So rather than blowing my mind with a ton of new ideas, this book helped me move along a road of thought I was already headed down and gave me some tools to assist my journey. And I got to share and grow with two of my truest friends. What a gift that is. - xo Sydney
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