Lessons from 30 years of living

We all have desires, it is only human to do so. But most of us have so many desires that we cannot possibly be happy. That is because you will never acquire all that you desire unless you only desire very few things. There is only so much any one person can achieve in their given life, only so many paths one can walk down. We must sacrifice something for each thing we gain, that is the balance of the scales of fate. To begin with, it is important to make sure that what you desire is that which is of most importance to you. There is no point in desiring every little thing in your life to be a certain way, there is simply not enough time, energy, or luck associated with any one person. Instead, we need to be actively pursuing the things that mean the most to us so that we do not become wasteful in our dreams.

Imagine the Aladdin story, you get three wishes. Life is a lot like this. You can only want so many things in your life before life itself becomes overwhelmed with the inability to acquire them. We run around chasing this and that, trying to perfect every tiny thing that exists inside our bubble. We chase shallow desires like the newest fashion trend or the cute girl behind the counter or a little more money. We lie to ourselves that if only we get the next thing, and the next thing, we will be happy. The truth is people who think this way will never be happy.

We must instead choose to desire things that hold deep significance and meaning in our lives. The strength to help a loved one in times of need, emotional resilience, or the ability to adapt and change with our circumstances. These are some examples of desires that are worth more than their weight in gold. They are not desires based on the actions of other people, they do not allow you to become a slave to another person or a slave to a material object. They allow you instead to cultivate a deeper knowledge of what is important in the world, and the ability to overcome the troubles that may come your way.

By doing this, you grant yourself more freedom, more energy and more time. You can then use this newfound energy to pursue the few things that you genuinely desire, and in turn, you get a double helping of awesomeness. Not only are you moving towards things of greater value, but life is simpler and you have more energy to achieve the things you want.

Difficulty

The human mind seems prone to searching out difficulty. Maybe it is because we lived in a survival situation for such a long time and just recently, stepped into a world of unbelievable comfort, one in which we have become soft to our external and internal environments. The conclusion is that with our extremely comfortable lives we have ended up believing that which is not true, that life can be carefully manipulated to avoid suffering. Instead of learning how to deal with the issues we have, accept and learn from them and move through them, we have become victims to a kind of God complex in which we believe that we can remove all suffering through the use of additional measures of comfort. This is not true, and the more we move down this path, the more we chase the proverbial dragon of sedation and comfort, and the less resilient our internal system becomes.

It would appear to me that difficulty and problem-solving are natural to human existence. These are things that we should be chasing, not running away from. This is not some sadistic pain-seeking exploit but instead the opposite, it is a philosophical journey, a decision to stand tall with your eyes open and not only face your pains, not just embrace them and understand how they will reward you, but seek them out. When you start searching for and bringing into your existence difficult things, you find that you start to work an internal muscle that creates a more stable foundation for you to stand on. With each thing you encounter you learn more about how to overcome struggles and be comfortable inside pain.

Something that I hear often is people of all ages, living what you may consider being very privileged lives, complaining about how hard their existence is as if they have something to complain about at all. We must each understand that there is a subtle balance in all things. If we live in excess, filled with desires, in comfortable means without any hardship, the brain will do something very interesting. It will create hardship all on its own. It will twist and contort itself, bending and morphing until it presents the host with a series of problems. It does this because it has nothing difficult to face, and difficulty is prone to human existence. Suffering and life are intertwined and if you do not have something hard in your external or internal life to apply yourself to then the mind will create its own messed-up set of problems so that it has something to solve.

The answer is simple in words but not so much in actions. Search out that which is difficult, set yourself a realistic goal, and make something of yourself and your time. Do not squander, do not give in to the frailty of comfort or the pathetic little voice inside yourself that makes up excuses and makes you believe you are some sort of victim. The truth is, we often suffer much more in our imagination than in reality.

Goals

The importance of goals cannot be overstated. The mind needs to grow with the ever-present change that dominates existence and it is valuable to grow in positive ways instead of in negative ways. This means knowing in which way you want to evolve so that you can move towards those goals instead of away from them. If we simply float through life without purpose, we are often quick to succumb to changes we never intended on making. This does not mean you have to have a strict regimen for how to achieve your goals, we are all different and all searching for something different in this life. It does however mean that you should know what it is you want to achieve within the next period of your life so that you can ensure your decisions on the daily honour that dream.

It can be anything you want. Something physical, such as sticking to an exercise schedule, or getting a promotion at work. It could be something financial, like clearing your debt or saving more money for a dream vacation. It could be something mental, like removing toxic self-destructive thoughts or becoming a better friend to yourself. It could be something moral or philosophical, such as being the kindest and most generous person you can muster.

One of the most magnificent and overlooked aspects of being a human being is the fact that you get to choose what you want and go after it. We can create our destiny, and forge our paths in life. Our possibilities are endless and often we are wasteful with our existence because we believe we are not capable of achieving that which we want the most. It does not mean that it will be easy, it most likely will not be easy but you can choose that to be the difficult thing you chase and give yourself purpose and meaning in doing so.

That's right, purpose and meaning. Two of the most powerful tools that you can harness in any and every situation to change the way you perceive the world around you and inside you. You can apply whatever meaning you need to a given experience to ensure it benefits you instead of bringing you down. You do this by changing the relationship you have with that experience, and in doing so, you change your world and the world around you.

Set some goals, make some easy, make some hard, and do not give up when you hit an obstacle. Push further and ask more of yourself, one of these days you might realize what it is you are made of.