Yes, you read that correctly. I wrote OMMS not OM. "What is OMMS?" you then ask.
Obstacles are my friend!
Read that and remember it. It's so important and it's the way great people make it through life. Notice I wrote "great" people and not "successful". This is because I believe if you're great, you are successful but the rest of the world might not classify you as successful but who cares. As I've written so many times before - success is something YOU define for yourself. If you go by other peoples' definition you may never reach that point.
But as usual i digress. Back to obstacles. Adversity or obstacles (to me they are interchangeable) are a part of life. But they are also subject to perception. What's a gigantic block for you might not even be in the way of someone else. It's all based on your experience and how you have been taught (or have learned) how to handle things that may be in your way. A problem solver or a person with a growth mindset (check out Carol Dweck's book called "Mindset" - it's an eye opener) just sees something else that excites them. "oh boy, i get to figure out another solution" whereas someone with a fixed mindset and perhaps a traumatic childhood looks at the same thing and cries out "oh God, why me. I can't handle another thing standing in my way to success. Why does this always have to happen? I am just going to turn around and go home. I can't deal with this."
Which would you rather be? I am learning to change my mindset to a growth mindset rather than the fixed one I've grown up with. That serves me no purpose now and probably never did but that was what i had at the time.
If you look at an obstacle and say "wow, what can i learn from this?" you'll be so much better suited to deal with what's coming down the road. This is a primary theme of my book because I learned so much about obstacles at Vol State last year. It's also why i took so long to do a "race report" about ATY. I had several obstacles (some were self created) and I had to take time to process them. My fixed mindset initially just said "well, that sucked. you didn't do very good. oh, well, there's always next year. but don't' think you're going to do Vol State any better because you just proved you can't do anything well."
Over the days after the race, i dusted off my new growth mindset and looked at the race with a different attire. Then i saw "ok, so it didn't go as well as you wanted. You didn't fail. You learned. But that is only helpful if you sit down and think about what you learned and how it will help you in the future and what you need to concentrate more on." And then you saw my "rule of 3s report". I had a totally different perspective by then. So, in the long run (no pun intended) I learned more from this "failure" than i would have had I reached either goal A or goal B.
One more thing before i close. I am living proof and have told you all a thousand times - everything always works out for me. Any obstacle that has stood in my way, has led me down a path to greater happiness and "success" than i had ever imagined. The most recent big adversity was the post shingles nerve pain. Had I not had that then a) my underlying kidney disease would not have been discovered until it was too late and b) i would have never found these concepts and practice around the cause and treatment of chronic pain and i believe that spreading the word and helping people with that is much more valuable than just cruising along. It's not to say that was an enjoyable time because it was horrible but what happened because of it was what was really pretty good.
Try to make OMMS your mantra and crave improving your emotional resilience!
Emmet Fox wrote this short piece about his experience when he first came to America. He saw a nice looking restaurant, went in and sat down. He waited and waited and waited and yet no one came to him to take his order. He was upset and a bit perplexed as many people around him were eating and seemed quite happy. He was feeling very neglected.
Finally he realized what a cafeteria was. They didn't have them yet in England where he came from. He discovered that there was plenty of food and goodies to have but you had to go up to the tables and choose from them.
The universe operates in just the same way. No one is going to bring you happiness or joy. You have to go up to the "buffet of life" and make your choices. Otherwise you may sit and wait forever, not getting anything out of life that you want.
So, if you want happiness, go to the happiness section and tell the universe mentally that you are claiming happiness for yourself. You don't necessarily need to detail what happiness means to you and in fact, you probably shouldn't. Why? Because what you think will make you happy today might not be it at all. I don't know if you remember when I told you i had wanted to be a neurosurgeon but then my epilepsy kept me from doing anything surgical. I thought that would bring me happiness and maybe it would have. But i will tell you that all the different things I ended up doing in my life made me extremely happy and I'm pretty sure I would not have been at such a state had I been able to go into neurosurgery. I received happiness and you will do once you claim it. But you don't really know today what will make you happy for the next 20 years or so.
Don't sit around waiting for things to happen for you. You have to take action in life. Once you decide what you want, then focus on that thought and ask youself some questions:
- What does this mean to me? - What can I do today to start me on the way to x (whatever it is you picked)? - How can I stay focused while it's being delivered to me and how can i always keep it in sight no matter what's going on around me? - what actions can i take to repay the universe for these wonderful things that are going to happen to me?
You want to start taking action to help yourself. It's the start that stops most people.
Find yourself wanting more time in your life? That seems like a common theme amongst people I know. Ask them why they can't or won't do something and more often than not, the answer is "I don't have enough time."
How often do you find yourself wanting to go do something and saying "it'll just be a minute". You go do it and the next thing you know an hour has passed. If you think that doesn't apply to you, keep track of things and how long you "plan" on doing something and then how long it actually takes.
This is one reason I've cut down on Facebook and am trying hard to cut down on my internet searches...even when I'm doing something related to a project. For example, I'll search for a quote about this or that. When the search engine comes up with its answers, there are many, many, many options and that ornery little voice inside of me says "yeah, this is a great quote BUT let's look at the next page - there might be an even better quote. Then at that page the same script is repeated. Eventually I've spent 15-30 minutes searching when i actually found what I'm going to use on the first try. Same with looking for "how to stuff"..."just maybe the next video will be more specific" and with videos it's worse because often you have to watch the whole thing to find out it didn't have what you needed.
When I would say "i'll just check Facebook, it will only take a minute" that was code to my brain for "yippee, a break. now i don't have to work hard on something else and I just know I can trap Terrie into scrolling just a 'little' bit more". One thing leads to another. And you know what? the "attention industry", as its called, does that on purpose.
If you spend 25 minutes a day doing something that is not helping you reach your goals, you will have essentially lost 152 hours in a year. What could you have gotten accomplished in those 152 hours? And I bet that most of us spend much more than 25 minutes doing Facebook, Instagram or engaging in some other mind and time trap.
Just think about this and its impact on your life. If you're happy with it and feel as if you have plenty of time, then that's great. If you're always hoping for more time, this might be one place to start. Do you know how many times a day you check your phone for something? Not only does that take time but it takes your attention away from other things and it takes you longer to get back on track.
The internet and technology are amazing and have brought us more education than we can imagine. But what else has it brought us? Can we balance it all and continue to extract the good stuff while keeping control of our lives?
Am I being prissy with this? Maybe but it's because I've actually started to pay attention to how my phone and the internet affect my quality of life. And based on the results of my experiments, i've made some changes. it's brought me greater happiness. My goal in these posts is to share what I learn with you. You can delete them, pay attention as nice to know or see if they apply to you. They may not apply and I would be very happy if they didn't. I just know i feel so much better without that clutter in my mind. Maybe it's because I'm old and there's more clutter in there...but i don't think so
