LIVING vs EXISTING, 5 LESSONS OF TAKING CHARGE

"To live is the rarest thing on earth. Most people just exist" ~ Oscar Wilde

Some years back, I took a Coachee through a thorough life assessment. Evidently, she had never done this proding assessment and by the time we were through, she was a wreck. She was totally mad with herself. She came to realize that she has been existing in life...not really living.

This and more stories are captured in my book that I am yet to title since I am spoilt for choice at the moment. The crux of this article though is that what I take my Coaching Clients through is not just text book. It is exactly what I have done myself over and over again and built much needed consistency.

Jim Rohn said:

"A life not evaluated is not worth living"

How so true! There is a small percentage of people in the whole world who are living....the rest of the people are existing.

You are existing if you do not know your life purpose yet you have millions of activities daily

You are existing if what you are doing for life is totally dependant upon what you hate

You are existing if you never have answered the question of the essence of life

You are existing if you do not occassionally re-evaluate your life

You are existing if you have no major aspiration that at least affect others other than your wife and kids...

Think about that. I could go on and on.

So anyway, the photo here is a snap shot of how my graph or living looks like for the month of January. From it, we learn the following lessons:

1. Life guarantees Failure: It is a fallen black world, and better yet, we are humans! Learn to accept the downs in life and even plan your resilience before hand. Failing to anticipate failure is not positive thinking, it is illusionary!
2. We must learn to bounce: Notice that the graph is not a straight line. It has ups and downs. For an upward trend, we should make sure that our next 'down' is higher than the previous.
3. Do not stay down: Notice that immediately I got down, the very next day I was right up. We need to learn to reduce our 'down time' so considerably. The longer you stay down, the harder it gets to get started again.
4. Tracking Ensures Consistency: One of my main motivators when I track my daily progress is to make sure that I at least equal yesterday's score and go one better by breaking the set record. This is internal motivation...and guess what? It is free of charge!
5. Beware of Shiny Objects: My graph shows that on two otccassions, I was derailed specifically by the trap of 'activity'. I delved into doing things that were not planned, filled up my time yet the activities contributed less to living and more to existing. Unfortunately, some people's whole lives are a chase after these shinny objects.

I am enjoying living life by design, and I guarantee you that it is very extremely rewarding. My mathematical functions show that in taking action, I achieved just over 60% in effort. February here we come!!