Avoiding Mid-Life Crisis

On this episode, I'd like to talk about keeping that New Year Resolution Feeling Alive. Every new year, millions of people around the world celebrate this new beginning.  Millions share new resolutions and goals knowing that they have 365 new chances to live out their greatest self. During the new year every year, our culture shifts the idea of a normal conversation. Instead of being asking, "What do you do?" at networking events or dinner, for instance, we're asked about our resolutions and the conversation focuses on the meaningful changes we all want to have in our lives. The collective positive energy around this time of year is palpable — like a race car driver waiting for the green flag to start. One foot on the brake, the other revving the supercharged engine. But for many, this feeling lasts only a few weeks at best. Like you also do, I create a list of yearly goals I intend to achieve that range from books I intend to read and experiences I intend to attract into my life. I fully intend to achieve these goals. But here's what I've learned. So often in my life I got way too attached to a goal and had a sort of tunnel vision. The destination, the goal, blinded me from the beauty of the journey. Being attached to the outcome of a goal, we  lose the beauty in each day.   So, how do we live our lives to the fullest, set goals, and soak up the marrow of life (As Thoreau would put it) without being too focused on an outcome? Practice and Non-Attachment Practice your intentions which could lead you to your yearly goals on a daily basis. If you intend to be more mindful, then set up a daily meditation practice, join a yoga studio, or find a new mindful mastermind group that builds you up to be a better person. If you intend to attract a positive cash flow in your life, then set up a daily practice towards building passive income, mastering a skill that would increase your hourly freelance cost, or delegate more tasks to automation or a team of assistants so you can focus on expanding your business. Dig deep into your practice. Work to achieve mastery. Just don't get too caught up in it. Practice non-attachment to your goal. If you have a goal to make "X" amount of money, try not to be so attached to that number that it causes you to act in a malevolent way towards another person and be less humble. If you have a goal to lose 25 pounds by summer, don't get down on yourself if you lose 20. Treat the means to the goal (each day) with just as much love and appreciation as the intended outcome. Goals can help us drive forward and live out the greatest version of ourselves only when we're not blinded by them. Perhaps attachment to resolutions and goals comes from a source of emptiness, as if we need a goal to feel a sense of being. This makes sense too, considering the overwhelming amount of messages that we get through media that tell us that our lives are not complete without a new gadget, a slimmer waistline, or more money. If we allow this type of messaging to control our feeling of well-being, we're attached to the outcome that a goal may bring and we've already lost the whole point of setting goals.The point of setting goals is to build us to be a better person so we can live out the greatest version of ourselves, or as Abraham Maslow would put it "living self-actualized." Practice. Practice. Practice. Just be open to spontaneity. Aristotle reminds us that "We are what we repeatedly do." If what we do every day is work so hard that we lose sight of the present, then we enter what Carl Jung called enantiodromia: a.k.a. a mid-life crisis. That's when one day, says Jung, after many years of working so hard that keeping busy becomes habit, we lift our heads up from work and wonder where the years have gone. As we continue throughout our lives, join me in remembering to look up every day. To see the art of the woodpecker as he meanders through the tree branches looking for that perfect spot to find breakfast. To witness that beautiful prism of color that fills the sky right before the sun rises above (or dips below) the horizon. To notice the way your partner looks at you with a smile when she thinks you don't notice. Yes, love, I see those looks you give me and I love em. — What about you? How do you enjoy both the journey and the destination of the goals we set in our lives?  Reach out and tell me by sending me an email at [email protected]