How To Accept AND Excel

How to accept what is and start growing toward what could be.In my latest book, Thrive Principles, one of my strategies is Accepting What Is.  Which has caused some readers to wonder how that fits into my ideas about constantly growing and changing.

They are not mutually opposed.  Accepting What Is creates a beginning point, a starting line.  From there, you can move toward who you want to be.  You can build a life of meaning and purpose.

Many people struggle with where they are.  But where we are is just that, our current spot.  Not a permanent place, but a starting point.

This week, I discuss how to both Accept What Is AND plot a growth course to become the person you want to be.  Make your impact with both sides of the equation.

“What Is” IS What Is

"What Is" is what is:  Immutable Law of LivingEver notice how much time and energy we spend (waste) struggling with “what is?”

We want things to be different than they are.  We want things to have happened differently than they did.

Yet here we are, and those things DID happen.

And we still spend time and energy thinking about how things “should” be different, trying to somehow “make” them different.  All to no avail.

We are better served coming to terms with “What Is,” and then choosing how to move forward.

Do you find yourself struggling with What Is?  Do you find yourself struggling to accept where you are and what has happened?

Let’s talk about how to stop wasting that time and energy.  What Is IS what is. . .

Immutable Laws Of Living Series:
Life Isn’t Fair
Life Has Challenges
Life Isn’t About Happiness
A Thought Is A Thought
Every Perspective Is Limited
Change Is Inevitable
People Do The Best They Can
We ALL Have Fears
Life is YOUR Responsibility

From “What If” To “What Is”

Shift from "What If?" to "What Is."We all can get lost in the Worries and Wishes.  We can lose our lives to “What If?”.

In the process, we lose focus on the present moment.  Instead, we focus on things that may never be, either worriedly or wishingly.

You see, your mind is excellent at scenarios that may play out in the future.  In fact, the scenarios and scenes are probably Oscar-worthy.

When I was sick, years ago, I realized that I could not live in the world of “What If?”  It took all of my energy to live in the world of “What Is”.

And it turns out, that was an important life lesson.

During my illness, of which there were some pretty significant (and deadly) consequences, I often said, “Let’s wait and see.”  When presented with potential effects of the illness, many told to me by well-meaning friends and family, I had to re-state, “Let’s wait and see.”

At least 95% of the “what if’s” never happened.

Isn’t that true with most of life?  Yet, we get caught up in those things down the road.  As Julius Caesar said,

As a rule, men worry more about what they can’t see than about what they can.

And yet, those future scenarios do nothing to prepare us for what is coming our way.  We just pretend it does.  And as Leo Buscaglia reminds us:

Worry never robs tomorrow of sorrow.  It only saps today of its joy.

Let’s make a shift.  Let’s move from “What If?”  Instead, let’s embrace “What Is.”  That is enough for the moment.

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