Today I am grateful for doing something different.  I took a break from the heavier material I’m reading and I picked up an easy book.  I’m about half-way through and the premise of the main character is that she has everything mapped out in her life and then it all falls apart.  Cliché or not, the experience is relatable.  The way she experiences the demise of all she knew is sudden and drastic and comes from a misunderstanding but in that coming undone, she finds a hobby, a new thing to occupy her.  And she finds freedom in doing something different.  It’s not the first time I’ve read or seen that type of thing, but something in the context of this story, where she tries so hard to do everything right and it still comes apart, hit me on a different level.  See, sometimes we are holding so tight to a vision that we choke the life right out of it.  We end up stopping all progress instead of letting it move.  We want so badly to make sure all will come together that we freeze it in place and it crumbles.  Lesson learned: trying something new could lead us to exactly the feeling, place, thing we wanted.  Don’t be afraid because it looks different, ask how it feels. 

Today I am grateful for choices.  I’ve realized lately that I truly don’t feel good about certain aspects of the way I am living.  It isn’t about playing victim, it isn’t about what has happened to me, I simply don’t feel good with where I’m at and I know I need to make some new choices.  I have too many things in my life to be grateful for to feel an ounce of anger, fear, regret and I feel those things all the time.  I’ve realized that it’s because I’m choosing to still feel that way.  I’m staying in environments that won’t change because I’m familiar so all the work I’ve done on changing thoughts goes out the window because the place requires the same actions.  I still have numbing and distracting behaviors—and I fall into distraction all the time.  So I’m realizing that in order to make some changes, I need to make different choices.  Yet again, I see that I’ve merely been dipping my toes in.  If I want my life to be a certain way, I need to make it a certain way and that means changing the behavior, which, in short, means new choices and committing to them.  A new life costs the old one so to move forward, I must face it and do what it takes.   

Today I am grateful for the details.  I have been struggling with some decisions at work—what opportunity do I take, what opportunity do I create, what is even going to be available to me.  I have limited information and this is going to solely rely on gut.  So I made a choice and I shared a request with my boss based on my honest opinion on the state of where one of my departments is.  This is a project I’ve loved from the beginning and I just can’t shake the feeling that it’s where I belong.  At the same time, someone I haven’t met in the organization prior to now reached out and I assisted him.  During the course of the conversation, I realized how attentive to detail he was.  We had met less than 10 minutes prior and he recalled details about me that showed me how important it is to pay attention to the details.  In the details we learn about people, we make connections, and we learn new ways of doing things.  I am grateful to see how important it is to get out of our own heads and start focusing on how we can share what we have/know with others.  That kind of bond is priceless.

Today I am grateful for shifting focus.  I’ve beat home how I want things to look for so long that I convinced myself that was the only way/answer.  I’ve gotten half-assed results for half-assed commitment.  Such a narrow focus with little commitment makes it like searching for a diamond in a forest at night with a head lamp and a teaspoon.  Yeah, it can get done but the actions aren’t nearly effective enough.  Similar to choking the life out of the vision I mentioned above, when we only see one path, we turn off the lights to the other doors/opportunities around us.  Sometimes we need to start wake up and work during the day so we can see all the paths in front of us.  Sometimes we need different tools.  And sometimes we need to acknowledge that we know what we are doing isn’t working, there seems to be no point, and it’s time to shift.  I used to think I would miss out on what I really wanted if I focused on other paths because I thought I had to focus on one thing.  Now I see our destiny is always there, we can choose any path to get there.  Some are longer or bumpier, but they all lead to the same place.  The only time we truly stray/go the wrong way is when we walk away from it.  Otherwise, make a choice and follow it. 

Today I am grateful for not throwing away an opportunity.  I overwhelmed myself because I have a lot of irons in the fire.  That isn’t to insinuate that other people don’t, I just have a lot that I’m doing on my own and it all seems in the same stages where nothing is quite off the ground yet.  Some days it literally drives me insane.  I have a lot of feelers out there so I now that part of me is also playing it safe, waiting to see what bites before making a decision on something.  As difficult as that makes it to wait for something to come through, I am glad to still have some lines in the water.  Some of them are for things I think have something behind them, something that I don’t have a super clear vision for, but a feeling that it’s something I’m supposed to do.  Sometimes a vision is all it takes.  Sometimes all it takes is standing firm and doing what we know is the right thing.  Even if it makes us feel alone, makes us stand out, we can at least stand in the certainty that we followed our values.  And I’m excited to see if something does bite on it because there is something in me saying that this isn’t an opportunity I should miss. Sometimes all it takes is a feeling to open the door.  I’m grateful to follow it this time.

Wishing everyone a wonderful week ahead.