The truth is often subjective. The general belief in the Middle Ages was that the earth was flat whereas now you can read in an encyclopaedia that it is round. Both views were/are accepted in their time as correct. Similarly, in the early to mid twentieth century tobacco smoking was not judged to be a harmful activity whereas knowledge accumulated over the years now points to the opposite.
This suggests that the truth is adaptable and may change depending on the beliefs of the time and facts available. Can we use this flexibility to our advantage and re-write what we believe to be true about our own lives?
For example, we may think that it is ‘true’ that we need a certain amount of money on which to live, that we need a degree to progress in our career or that we have to be under a specified age to undertake a particular activity. But who says that these things are true? Even if it is written down somewhere in a respected publication, we know from the examples at the beginning of this article that facts can be changed or re-interpreted. So why don’t we just go right ahead and start changing these truths for ourselves?
Perhaps we can change our belief about our capabilities. Perhaps we could examine some of the limits we place upon ourselves and see if they really are valid. Maybe we can gain more knowledge and experience in our chosen field and alter our expected outcomes.
Why be passive and let external factors determine the truth of our existence? Why not rewrite our own personal history starting from today!
A year ago I signed up for a service offered by www.dreaminder.com. The idea is that you write down your goals or dreams and then they email you back exactly a year later with what you wrote.
Today I received my email and it was really inspiring to look at what I had written. My dream was in two parts, one to do with my book, Tales of the Countess, and the other about my Lead The Life business. I haven’t yet achieved my goal with Tales of the Countess but my Lead The Life stuff is going very well. I really enjoyed getting this reminder and am going to put in another entry to receive this time next year.
It doesn’t matter if you do not achieve your goals within a set timeframe. What does matter is that you are taking action towards them. If you are then you will achieve them at some point in the future. So even if it takes several yearly dream reminders before Tales of the Countess is a best selling book, who cares. Every year my writing improves and each draft is a better book than the draft before.
PS - I’ve been to www.dreaminders.com and the site is down pending improvements at the moment. However, they have just emailed me to say it is back on 10th July, so put a reminder in your calendar to visit it on that day.
This morning I was on my way to a coaching appointment and discovered that one of the tube lines I planned to take had severe delays. In order to make the appointment on time I immediately decided to take a black cab instead. Usually there are always cabs available close to where I live but at this crucial moment there weren’t any. It was thirty-five minutes before my appointment was due to begin and I was still only a few yards from my front door. Then at last I saw a yellow light on the horizon, hailed the cab and got in.
My next panic was about traffic. Many times when taking a cab to the Hubworking centre, where I do all my face to face coaching, I have been stuck in a traffic bottle neck around Blackfriars and have had to frantically walk the last fifteen minutes. After weighing up the route options with the driver we decided to go via London Bridge instead.
I had a lovely chat with the cab driver who was a very cheery fellow and said that he never liked to moan or complain about things, unlike many of his colleagues. He then said, “I think life is much easier if can be happy on a day to day basis; then stressful things don’t get you down as much.”
I thought this was a wise expression. If we can elevate ourselves to a happier life state, then it is easier to navigate our way through the day to day challenges. Difficult or bad events will still happen but they won’t impact us a negatively. On the other hand if we are in a low life state and always moaning about everything then such events will only put more fuel on the fire of misery.
It was a really enjoyable conversation, I arrived with twenty minutes to spare and the journey provided me with this week’s blog. That’s what I call a happy result!
