THE WAKE UP CALL
I remember when I got the wake-up call. I wasn’t perfect. Far from it. A few people walked out of my life. It’s what I needed at the time. I didn’t know what to do. I had never experienced this isolation before. I was really vulnerable for the first time. I reached out. It was the beginning of the path of awakening that I’ve been on for the last forty years. I began meditating.
I’ve come a long way. When I began this journey I was solution oriented. If I did this, I would get this result. So I began to take personal growth courses with the idea that the key to everlasting happiness would be unlocked. When I finished with the training or course, I would feel happy and excited for a while, but inevitably I would reach a plateau.
But I was open and the next thing would come along and I was ready to again try to discover the answer. I would think to myself, “If I do this consistently, I’ll be happy. Or if this case settles, I won’t have any money problems for a while.”
Then one day I made a profound shift. I realized that I was a curious person and that I liked to explore new ideas and to learn new things. From that day on I continued to try new things, not with the idea that they would fix me, but because I enjoyed them. I was a committed life long learner. I still am. It keeps me fully engaged with life.
Everyday living involves growing and expansion. Just like nature’s cycles, there is a growing season and then one in which the flowers bloom. Then the leaves fall wistfully to the ground and the trees become barren. That’s our life. This cycle never stops. We keep growing and then step back and process what we’ve learned up to this moment in our lives. And then the cycle repeats itself.
ENJOY THE JOURNEY
MARK