Are You Selling Your Precious Life or Are You Living It?

People- humans- we are all alike, yet so different. We are complex creations. We are also creators, constructing various aspects of what we call “life”. The dreams you dream, the callings of the heart that you follow, are all individualized to a version of “ideal”- the ideal self, the ideal job, the ideal life. We often ask children what they would like to be when they grow up. Yet when they grow, we stop asking them to dream. We start asking them to be practical, to settle in somewhere, to be stable, generate income, basically sell their hours of life doing “something”, and become complacent until the age of 65. Where is the magic in that model of living?

You were born a unique person with a unique makeup of gifts, talents, interests! Small children aren’t afraid to dream, no matter how big or small, practical or outlandish the dream may be. They don’t censor their dreams. They just know what they love; what makes them feel joy. They’re not concerned with salary, titles, or 401k accounts. Perhaps we need to revive the state of dreaming big dreams and redefine what it truly means to be successful.

Success can mean many things and its definition is as unique and individualized as each human being. There is no one size fits all. Many rich and famous celebrities will tell you that fame and fortune did not fulfill them. There is no dollar amount, material possession, or degree of popularity that can buy happiness. So, if being successful by societal means doesn’t bring you happiness, then are you really successful? Speaking in an existential manner, we have this one life, and one day it will be over; is one successful if they are not happy?

We discover many things that make us happy when we are children. And the list accrues as we grow older. It is easy when we are children, to be natural, carefree, filterless, and genuine. We discover our gifts, our interests, and our passions. We entertain them for a while, usually as extracurricular activities. Then we get jobs that we may or may not love and begin to sell our time for x amount of money, in order to acquire material things. And it can become a very robotic lifestyle for the next fifty years until retirement.

It becomes robotic because we are not honoring our own unique individual callings. Instead, we honor society’s definition of success; work a job making as much money as you can until you’re 65 and then hope you have the time and savings to enjoy the fruits of your life’s work, should you have the health and vitality to do so. Why do we need to sell fifty years of our precious lives doing work that doesn’t spark any passion whatsoever? Or worse yet, performing a job you hate, 8 hours/day, 5 days/week, for 50 years. This is not about loving every minute or having a smooth and easy day every day at work. Grit has its place. But you’ve got to love it. It has to mean something to you to make the grit a part of growth, rather than a toll.

We spend one third of our lifetime working. What if we didn’t settle? What if we chose to do the good work that we truly aligned with? The work that honors our individual unique gifts and personalities. The work you actually care about and are passionate about! Not just a means of an income, but a means of fulfillment. This, to me, is what making a living should be about- making a living, in the most literal sense. This style of living passionately creates more harmony for the individual as well as the collective. As opposed to one who robotically does his job every day, but doesn’t care too much about his role, therefore he experiences lack of fulfillment in the workplace and what he is offering to the world. The more love you have for what you are doing, the more you naturally want to give. Can you imagine if more people answered their heart’s calling?! We’d have less cranky co-workers and far more positive interactions in all regular areas of business and living! That’s a win-win. To live in harmony with who you are raises the collective vibration immensely, on a small local scale and on a large broad scale. There is good work to be done for every type of person there is. Know thyself; your innermost being and listen.

Dare to dream. Follow your bliss, your heart’s call. Run towards the things that ignite your soul! Life is short and there are no guarantees. There is only one you and you have this one life. Reignite the magic of it all; of being alive! Get out there and be who you are! Live in your authenticity. Go after your dreams. A life lived fully and authentically is a life well lived. And that is the true definition of success.

Cheers.