PURPOSEFUL DECISIONS…PURPOSEFUL LIFE
I am currently away on vacation, which is a yearly ritual that I adopted several years ago as a way to celebrate my birthday- August 3rd. This year, I find myself in Roatán, Honduras- a common question I get from the locals is why Roatán? Well, literally, what I did was google best places to stand up paddle board when I returned last year from Tulum and Roatán was one the places that came up so here I am...A week of nothing but serenity, some bug bites, and a new place in the world that I have visited.
Also part of my yearly ritual is that I run into people who have left their lives behind in search of more balance, purpose, and a different lifestyle. Others fall in love while on vacation return to wherever home is - sell it all and start their new lives with their significant others. Some of these stories are pretty motivating. After all what isn't motivating about someone who succeeds at leaving their uptight job/life behind to replace it with crystal clear water and a laissez faire island life.
Yet, I have to wonder how different would things be if we spent more time asking ourselves throughout various stages of our lives, what is it that you like? What do you enjoy? What do you want to do? Would those people who have been more introspective about who they are be less inclined to make drastic decisions in search of purpose or would they ease into doing and living with purpose because they would have made purposeful decisions in their lives?
What if we spent more time alone with ourselves? I am in the middle of reading, Quiet- The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking where the author discusses the power of solitude: "What's so magical about solitude? It's only when you're alone that you can engage in Deliberate Practice, which he (Ericsson) has defined identified as the key to exceptional achievement. When you practice deliberately, you identify the tasks or knowledge that are just out of your reach, strive to upgrade your performance, monitor your progress, and revise accordingly." (Cain, Susan 81).
Personally, I have always preferred alone time, and credit a lot of who I have become to spending an immense amount of time with myself. I am not burdened by my thoughts if anything I am motivated by them. In her book, Cain goes on to write, "Deliberate Practice is best conducted alone for several reasons. It takes intense concentration, and other people can be distracting. It requires deep motivation, often self-generated. But most important, it involves working on the task that's most challenging to you. If you want to improve what you're doing, you have to be the one who generates the move." (Cain, Susan 81). So if you want to improve aspects of your life maybe the key is to deliberately practice on making purposeful decisions. Maybe, it's taking the time to self discover who you are and why you do the things you do...Don't like something? You have the power to change that.
Don't get me wrong I love a good story of someone who left it all for a more purposeful/meaningful life...but it does leave me thinking about how these particular people approached life before deciding for such a drastic change.
My hope is that everyone reading this engages in practicing purposeful decisions...leading you to a more purposeful life. #Namaste from Honduras
