Why do so many of us allow ourselves to marinate in a stagnant, stale day to day life? One of the answers to this question, and I think the main one, is that we are typically afraid of change. When change happens in our lives it isn’t usually because we instigated it, it is because there was an earthquake, a family member died, we got laid off, or we were in a car accident.
We need to take the bull by the horns and cause disruption in our own lives so we stay on our toes and keep from becoming too comfortable. This life is short, consider that the average overall life expectancy in the U.S. is 78.5 years, that is roughly 28,652 days, well I’ve already lived roughly 12,410 days. If you break it down further, 78.5 years is about 687,660 hours and I’ve already spent about 297,840 of those.
I try, to the best of my ability, to do something that makes me uncomfortable each day; not only does that become a learning experience but it broadens my thoughts and opinions. When I look at my life over the past decade it appears to take on the look of an experiment, it has been a steady progression of trial and error mixed with a sh!t ton of reflection. The changes, mostly induced by life and not myself, have all turned out to be amazing, even though when they were happening I was stressed out or depressed.
And that is why I have these thoughts now, I have been through many things and faced them with a negative outlook; with a slight shift in my thinking, to look at change as an adventure and that the best will be made of it, I do not encounter the stress as I once did. I now refused to marinate in the negativity, the monotony, and the naysayers.
If you are looking for change, you will have to initiate it; don’t wait for the catastrophe. Change does not get delivered to your front door via UPS. Change is not scary and irreversible. If you never go out to dinner on a Tuesday night, go out to dinner on a Tuesday night. If you never write down your thoughts, start. If you never go barefoot, go now. Little changes like that which bring momentary discomfort are great exercises to begin with. Once you become more comfortable with being uncomfortable, start attempting bigger things.
As I showed you in a previous paragraph, the days and hours are ticking away. Jump in head first, stop over thinking it. This is our one shot to make a difference and make an impact on the world, and it starts with change.
Great writing Matt! You are right, change can be uncomfortable, but if we know the result we want and find a path that may be able to take us there, fear is a mile high, a mile wide, but it’s only paper thin, once you step through it’s never as uncomfortable as we made it up to be in our own mind.
This was very well written, can I post it up on my blog with a link back to yours?
Hey Jeremy, thanks for the kind words, and I do agree…fear is indeed in the mind, the first step is the hardest. Feel free to link to this post, thanks!
It’s so funny that before I logged in here I was finding myself saying “what should I do with myself today?” I have had many ideas like take care of that landscape project I’ve been putting off, bake some Christmas cookies for gifts, send out some emails to work prospects, clean the house, write in my blog? Today will never come again and I am finding discomfort in the lack of structure to my day today.
So what change can I make? It has to start with my mind. I am going to choose to tell myself that no matter what I do today I will enjoy every minute of it and put my best effort into it. That’s what I’m going to do today!
Gina, I struggle with motivation many days because I don’t see the outcome I expect to see, however, I’ve been realizing that the outcome may not be what I think it should be. It could be something bigger and better if I remain open to it. First and foremost I need to do the things that fulfill me each day…create, think, take action, inspire, and love each moment with family and freinds. As long as I do those things the outcome doesn’t always matter.