life is life (nana na na na)
I'm an intense person. The other day my bestie said, "this is a compliment, but you can be rigid" and I was complimented. I am pretty stern in my ways and my beliefs. But lately I have been thinking a lot about something that an old friend said to me years and years ago. She said, "sometimes people are so goal oriented that they don't see what's going on in front of them, they don't leave room for life to happen."
I am goal oriented. I'm driven, apparently, I'm also rigid. I've been described as a thoroughbred and a freight train, there is nothing stopping me. Ever. And lately I have felt like I am just battling. As though I am fighting for my best life. When asked by my bestie what it was that I was battling for, I hadn't a clue what to respond. While in a cute store today I stopped in my tracks with the answer. I read a silk screened throw pillow that read: LIFE IS A STORY make yours a bestseller.
Normally that would be a mantra that I would plaster above my sign post. I would tattoo it on my brain and make it my driver. Today, however, I wanted to knife that pillow. Sometimes life is life. And it doesn't have to be this incredible best selling novel. It isn't a competition. We are all running our own races, and pillows like this make ourselves our own worst competitor. But life doesn't have to constantly be a bestseller to be good.
Years ago when Facebook was in its infancy you got to write out all of your favourite quotes and I copied and pasted Rules For Living by Olivia Joules. Which is really Helen Fieldings' rules that she made up for this character. And there is one rule that has stuck with me that I do sincerely live by, "No one is thinking about you. They're thinking about themselves, just like you." Once you grasp that fundamental truth, doing anything is not nearly as terrifying. Everyone is caught up worrying about what they're wearing, what they're working on, where they are at in life, that they aren't really as obsessed with what you're wearing, what you're working on, or where you are at in life as you would like to think that they are. It is wonderfully freeing to lock into that. And people who are that obsessed with your life truly need to get their own, am I right?
We have become extremists and I think it is wearing people out, myself included. Not only do we have to participate in life but we have to win at it.
This must be what the 30s are all about. The 20s are all about finding yourself and winning, the 30s are about participating with what you have, showing up and playing the game. My bestseller of a life may never be exciting enough to be read by anyone except the people who are closest to me. And for me, at this point in my life, in this moment, that is life.
That's all.
I am goal oriented. I'm driven, apparently, I'm also rigid. I've been described as a thoroughbred and a freight train, there is nothing stopping me. Ever. And lately I have felt like I am just battling. As though I am fighting for my best life. When asked by my bestie what it was that I was battling for, I hadn't a clue what to respond. While in a cute store today I stopped in my tracks with the answer. I read a silk screened throw pillow that read: LIFE IS A STORY make yours a bestseller.
Normally that would be a mantra that I would plaster above my sign post. I would tattoo it on my brain and make it my driver. Today, however, I wanted to knife that pillow. Sometimes life is life. And it doesn't have to be this incredible best selling novel. It isn't a competition. We are all running our own races, and pillows like this make ourselves our own worst competitor. But life doesn't have to constantly be a bestseller to be good.
Years ago when Facebook was in its infancy you got to write out all of your favourite quotes and I copied and pasted Rules For Living by Olivia Joules. Which is really Helen Fieldings' rules that she made up for this character. And there is one rule that has stuck with me that I do sincerely live by, "No one is thinking about you. They're thinking about themselves, just like you." Once you grasp that fundamental truth, doing anything is not nearly as terrifying. Everyone is caught up worrying about what they're wearing, what they're working on, where they are at in life, that they aren't really as obsessed with what you're wearing, what you're working on, or where you are at in life as you would like to think that they are. It is wonderfully freeing to lock into that. And people who are that obsessed with your life truly need to get their own, am I right?
We have become extremists and I think it is wearing people out, myself included. Not only do we have to participate in life but we have to win at it.
This must be what the 30s are all about. The 20s are all about finding yourself and winning, the 30s are about participating with what you have, showing up and playing the game. My bestseller of a life may never be exciting enough to be read by anyone except the people who are closest to me. And for me, at this point in my life, in this moment, that is life.
That's all.
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