ReMindEd   •   January 9, 2017

I was spending some time this past week in reflection: actually I tend to do this every week, so no surprises there!  I was thinking about my goals for the year, the idea that my husband and I want to design our life and what that would look like. It’s a good question to perhaps ask yourself this week….

“What does my ideal life look like? What can I start doing today to be one day closer to living in that place?”

Another word I use to describe this is the ‘promised land’. That place you always wanted to get to, and not just a holiday destination but a place you can live. And just to clarify, it might not be a new geographical location- it may well be where you are living now, but with some added ideals.

A friend of mine once asked me:

“If you could do anything you wanted to do with no limitations, what would that place look like?”

It’s a worthwhile question to ask.

I was working with a client in my counselling practice a few weeks ago, who said she stumbled upon an old list she had penned some ten years ago, listing three double-sided pages (she was thorough, intentional, thoughtful and specific) of things she wanted in her life, what she hoped to do, how she wanted to live: her ideals. She was encouraged in reading it to find she could tick off nearly all of them- she is living in a town she adores, has her dream job, has a blessed marriage and lovely children, has beautiful friends and a strong connection to her community. She smiled proudly reading the list, grateful that her life had progressed more than she had acknowledged.

She also reflected on remembering when she sat writing the list- of the ways she thought the items would be out-worked and how they would look to be ticked off. She smiled again, realising life had happened very differently over those ten years than she had thought it would when she wrote the list. She also reflected on how many things had worked out better than she’d hoped, and how many of the hard times worked out for good, even for great!

There were also still things she could identify as being on her new list- that’s the nature of life and it’s progression- there is always another step to take, something else to work towards, new dreams to fulfil. Which is healthy, for the most part.

If tainted by perfectionism, goals become allusive burdens that are forever tormenting us to what we don’t have. Perfectionism steals our now and what we already have, by making us focus on the next thing in the fear of missing out should we lose sight of it. The interesting thing is perfectionism is the very reason we will never actually get to where we want to be, because it simply doesn’t exist. It will never be perfect enough, there is always more we could do or something else we didn’t get. Perfection is a lie.

But really great anyways exist! And you are there already if you choose to see it that way!

A simple test for this is to write the following lists:

“What am I thankful for?”

“What am I thankful for despite?”

If you write these in that order, it will change the second list and you’ll see the gold that came from all the things that happened that weren’t part of the plan. And suddenly, you’ve turned around everything from a failure to an opportunity, from hurt to healed, from “what the’s” to “what now’s”.

So grab a journal, grab a pen, or grab your tech of choice, and reflect on last year differently. Write your new list purposefully and aim for really greats because they are actually ideals.

Happy list making!

Always for freedom,

Sal

#bravenewyear