A 10 is a 10!
For each of us, whatever the overall level of satisfaction we experience in our lives, chances are there is room for growth. Chances are you want more. Chances are you want more joy in your work, more love in your relationships, chances are you have bigger dreams that you want to fulfill, and chances are there is a bigger difference that you want to make with your life. Regardless of what you want in the future, today your life is in some current state.
Today, if you rate your life overall a 6 (on a scale of 1 to 10), then it’s a 6. Most of us have been taught that to find happiness the game of life is to move our 6 to a 10. In my experience, this is not the most efficient way to create more happiness in your life. Why is that? The answer is actually quite simple. First, trying to take a 6 and make it a 10 puts off the joy until another day. The old, “I’ll be happy when….” You don’t have to cheat yourself out of the joy of creating your life. You can enjoy the ride now. The second reason it’s not the most efficient way to create more happiness is you’re trying to make your life into something it’s not. A “6” is a “6”. A “10” is a “10.” Period. You cannot change a 6 into a 10, anymore than you can change a car into a boat, or a dog into a cat. All you can do is create a 10.
To end up with a life that’s a 6, you thought like a 6, you held the beliefs of a 6 and you took action consistent with the thinking of a 6. Given who you’ve become to date, it couldn’t have turned out any other way. Some of you will think this is bad news or use this as more evidence that something’s wrong with you. In fact, just the opposite is true. This is good news; it’s really good news. Honestly, it’s great news! It means that your life didn’t result because there’s something inherently wrong with you. You life resulted from your thinking. Period, end of story. I don’t care what’s happened to you in your life, your life resulted from your thinking. Until you can fully own that you are the responsible for all of it, every nook and cranny of your life, you won’t fully be able to create what you want. You’ll just be stuck trying to make a 6 into a 10, and you know how that goes.
Taking ownership of your life, declaring that you’re the author of all of it is not an act of burden. It’s an act of freedom. Fully owning your life gives you tremendous power because until you do, you mind is just going to keep fighting with you. It’s just going to keep telling you how wrong he is or she is or it is or you are. When you take ownership of it all, your mind quiets. It sort of stops and says, “Well, alright then … what’s next?” And when that happens then you truly are free to move on from what you’ve created (a 6) and put your focus where it belongs … on creating a 10!
4 comments
YES! I loved this article. Not only because it is so true and profound, but because it means that the world is getting more of the amazing BG. Hooray! So I will be eating up my 7 today and delighting in it.
-Amy
Yes, I am inspired by this article too. And I appreciate the writings that are truly done from the heart. (I have recently read your book too). I feel like I am missing a piece of the puzzle though. I keep hoping to read about specific things that people have done designing a life where good things happen naturally. I get a little tripped up when I think about my own situation and feel like most ideas are still based upon the old paradigm.
@ Ariel - Thanks for the thoughts (and for reading my book). You’re not missing a piece of the puzzle. In fact, if you feel like you’re missing a piece of the puzzle than that means you got the intention of the book. A way of life where good things happen naturally is something to be invented. If I asked you to design a new car or a new chair that is more appealing than the car you have - some images of what that would look like pop into your head. What pops into your head when you think a way of life where good things happen naturally for people? How would you be living in that way of life that’s different from how you live now? How would living in a way of life where good things happen naturally feel?
Still, I understand your need for examples. I’ve always hesitated to offer example because I didn’t want people to rest on those examples as conclusions of what this new way of life might be. Perhaps it might help to let go of designing a way of life and use the book and this blog to study design.
Thank you so much for writing such a thoughtful answer to my question. I understand how giving examples would impede others from coming to their own conclusions. And your idea about studying design first is helpful. I am thinking that you mean studying the design that we have in place now, how it shows up in our day to day life, and what it has created.
Thank you again. I find your writings to be very optimistic. A line I reread today and enjoyed was: “Life is a wonder, and it’s time for you to see.” (A suggestion to clear out some of the cobwebs?)
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