Forward is a pace...

Since the start of the new year I have been uber focused on self-help books. So basic and cliché am I. Ferociously reading through pages of this and that, hoping for something to bring me to the “ah ha” moment that will set me on a course of health and good-will towards men, for the rest of the year. Guess how it’s going…

It’s not. I’m so busy searching for a piece of peace that I’m now in constant chaos. I’m changing up so much of everything that I am buried under the thumb of a pretty steep learning curve. Of all the wellness I have tried to lasso, please grapple with this for a second: In his book, “Breaking the Habit of Being Yourself”, Dr. Joe Dispenza hammers away at this one thing: We are hardwired to wake up in the past. Every.Single.Day. Each morning, our very first thoughts revolve around what we want to change about yesterday. Or last week. Or ten years ago. And it’s not our fault. Our brains are hardwired to do this. There’s virtually no way out of it. Or is there?

Since reading this one chapter of his book and immediately running to YouTube to listen to him outline his thesis, I have been laser-focused on my first thought, every morning. And there it is. Yesterday. I think about how I “slipped up” on my eating and how I may have raised my voice 13 times to the kids instead of the 8 I set out to do. I think about the book I didn’t pick up (again) or the laundry that’s still in the washer (it’s still in there as I write this). I will have to rewash it and that’s yesterday’s problem, infiltrating my today. Yesterday’s meals, needing today’s treadmill, and like that.

So what do we do people? The answer is so elusive and hard to catch, but essentially it comes down to unmemorizing how you think. We humans are so limited in our ability to absorb new things that fundamental change is a full body work-up. It’s not our fault, it’s the human condition. In order to change, one single aspect of your life, you have to teach your memories to go to sleep so you can fully absorb new ones, thus creating a new pattern. Capiche?

Yeah, me either. There is some meditation involved (more on that later), but one great take away is this: The journey is forward. Uphill. Mountainous and tall, but ahead. Not behind. And no matter what your scales say, your mind needs to tip in today’s direction. It doesn’t matter how you move through today or what you call your journey it just matters that you are on it. In the words of my friend Wendy Chioji (www.growingboulder.com) whilst relaying a story about a family member who was asked what her pace was during a marathon, the retort - which has never left me - was this; “Forward, forward is a pace.”

What ever happened yesterday, put it to bed. Run as far and as fast as you can towards your today and your future. Pick up today’s dreams and work on them. Cross new bridges, despite the ones you’ve burned. Those small fires don’t define you, they validate you. Worrying about the life you’ve not lived or the one you feel you’ve blundered is of no consequence to you right now. Your past is beautiful and important and belongs to only you. But now is the time to wave it good bye from today’s vast expansion of terrain, even if your laundry is still on it.

Best Always,

Christine