You can’t advance in a direction you have no idea of.  There are times it feels like we live life like we’re trying to hit a dartboard.  We wander aimlessly just hoping to hit something. Sometimes we get a vague idea of what we want to do and we need to take a few steps forward so we can get a clearer view.  But we can’t expect to get to wherever “it” is if we simply keep throwing darts with no real aim.  This statement reinforces the point I made yesterday about stopping to ask different questions to get to the real meaning of life.  When we stop taking in the influence of the entire world and get comfortable discerning what is truly ours, we will often find the direction we’ve been looking for.  We spend so much time convincing ourselves that we aren’t doing enough that we end up doing with no purpose, running around for the sake of running around.  When did it become so difficult to sit with quiet? What are we afraid to hear?  I think the soul knows it’s lost and it wants us back on track but we struggle to reconcile what it wants with what’s happening around us—they can be very different things. 

We lose sight of which way to go with distractions out there and the influence of others and we get the wrong idea of what life is about/what it’s supposed to look like.  We focus more on what it’s supposed to LOOK like than what it’s supposed to FEEL like.  We’re told what it should look like and we’re told what to do to get there.  As we all know, that formula doesn’t work for everyone.  It’s true that advancement is relative as well.  What may seem like baby steps to some is someone else’s Grand Canyon.  Whether it’s doing what we are told, seeing the influence of others around us, or feeling we’re doing something wrong, the root is the same: comparison.  I know that lizard part of our brain is afraid to let go of control and it likes to make sure we know exactly where we stand with those around us because if we aren’t keeping up then we surely won’t survive.  Our inner knowing gets all mucked up and confused when we look outward for answers.  So we wind it back to ourselves. 

To get where we want to go we need to put aside those fears and distractions. We need to train the lizard brain to calm down and evaluate what actually matters.  Once we have all that under control, we can stop the game of comparison.  It’s worth repeating: we can’t compare our chapter one to someone’s chapter 20.  Once we understand that, we listen to what our inner knowing has been trying to tell us all along.  We find our direction.  If we don’t listen we will spend our lives drunkenly throwing darts in the hopes of landing somewhere good.  The first key is to make sure we’re aiming at the right board—do we have the right intent in our lives?  We need to know what it is we want.  Then we figure out how to get there.  As any good dart player will tell you, it takes practice to master the game.  We all need a little practice refining our course every now and then, we are human and we will ALL wander off our path at some point.  But the more we practice guiding ourselves the closer we get to the bullseye, our personal true North.  Keep aiming until we hit it-it’s even better than 50 points.