Which ones will you choose? Check out this short video with predictions from the 1950′s as they are actually lived by some people in the present.
Watching this video made me wonder about the question, “Out of all the opportunities that we could have chosen for our current day experience what guided our choices so that we ended up here?” If we could have foreseen where we would end up would we make those same choices again? What can our present teach us about rectifying things in the future? There are many opportunities. Our present is only one of an infinite number of choices.
What choices did you make that took you to your present?
What choices can make now that will lead you to a better future?
What is the opportunity that each choice presents?
Whenever I think of July 4th, I think of freedom. When I got up this morning I read a bit from Mary Pipher’s excellent new book, “Seeking Peace: Chronicles of the Worst Buddhist in the World”. I was powerfully moved by this sentence: “Religions are metaphorical systems that give us bigger containers in which to hold our lives.” Although I meditate and have read many books on Buddhism, I’m not officially a Buddhist. However, Buddhism has allowed me to explore the idea and the experience of freedom in a way that I hadn’t previously encountered.
True freedom for me is freedom from my obsessive self-castigating thoughts. My mind produces thousands of these thoughts each day. Mindfulness is the larger container that allows me to notice them and not become one with any single one of them. I’m not often successful in remaining unattached to individual thoughts. They are so inviting, with their magnetic pull toward a seemingly stable identity of me as an insufficient, narcissistic and selfish person. In those moments of ego identification with those thoughts I’m steadfastly not cognizant of any of my altruistic and generous thoughts or actions. I hate myself for not living up to my own ideals and even worse for hurting others by my own insistence on any thought or action that could relate to my own well being. Read the rest of this entry »
Duh! Of course to win any game you must intend to win. Consistent wins are not a matter of chance. You must know your game inside and out, know your strengths and weaknesses and practice your skills everyday. However, as any winning athlete will tell you, your mental game is just as important as your physical game.
And this is where intent is most important. When you make choices in your life, how many are truly intentional and how many are made with minimal awareness or care about impact? Most likely you make big decisions with great awareness and smaller decisions with lesser awareness. Now imagine what your life would be like if everything you did or chose was made from conscious intention and awareness. Read the rest of this entry »