“If you change nothing, Nothing will change.”
~ Unknown
I was happy for the clouds this morning. As I waited for the sunrise that never came, trying to compose my thoughts. I feel like I could write a book here …
I spent most of my day yesterday, procrastinating. Reflecting.
A couple of things showed up in my Facebook feed, like divine messages from that Infinite Intelligence I so often talk about.
It started by a fellow blogger asking: “What is the difference between “giving up” and “letting go”?
The various responses given by her readership were interesting.
Then came a message from ‘The Universe’ by Mike Dooley:
“Have you noticed how lacking clarity, is clarity itself? Honor it, and yourself.”
A number of commenters where stumped … Say, what?
Then later, Michael J. Fox: “Acceptance doesn’t mean resignation. It means understanding that something is what it is and there’s got to be a way through it.”
I couldn’t seem to get the story of Thomas Edison out of my mind. What it must have been like for him. Knowing very deep inside himself that he had the ability to harness light in a glass tube. Trying over, and over, and over again. It is said he tried 10,000 times. How many days of futility is that?
Most of us would have given up. Deemed our idea a complete and utter failure. Yet Edison knew these failed attempts simply as the process of elimination required to achieve success. He let go of or shifted ideas that didn’t work out. But he NEVER quit and gave up on his dream.
There will be times, as we move towards our goal, that we will be unsure. That there will be lack of clarity.
And on these days, we most likely will find ourselves feeling like we are procrastinating.
I’ve come to term these days as “Letting the pot stew.” Because honestly, it’s nothing that my logical, conscious mind can work out for me. The subconscious has to do it. And so I sit and wait. Tasting my pot of stew, adding in a few spices here, a few spices there, until finally the soup comes together.
It takes PERSISTENCE to turn our dreams into reality. Hill defines persistence as “the sustained effort necessary to induce faith.”
When I got home from yoga yesterday morning, my schedule told me that it was “Finance Friday”. This month, that means cleaning up end of year accounting and filing taxes.
What I really wanted to be doing was dabbling in photoshop. Or writing some more. To try out a few new “recipes” I have for this idea that’s stewing. To see if I can’t prompt my subconscious into responding.
Instead, I forced myself to get through some paperwork. But I couldn’t help but think how sick and tired I am of this same mound of paperwork, emails full of crap I need to delete or respond to, month after month …
I got onto Facebook, to procrastinate some more, and to pull a quote I’d seen earlier in the day, to pin it to my whiteboard, where I can look at it every day:
“If you change nothing. Nothing will change.”
First up in my feed, along comes more aid from “Paying It Forward”:
“You can’t reach for anything new if your hands are still full of yesterday’s junk.”
I screamed, “But when will I reach the bottom of my pile !?!?!?!?!”
I’m not sure I have the answer. But I do know this:
“You have to be truly fed up. You’ve got to be sick and tired of being sick and tired to make a change.”
If I really love what I’m doing, there is no bottom to the stack. I’m bored senseless with the mundane tasks required of my life. I don’t want to be doing them. And they are totally killing my creativity. There just isn’t enough time & space for it.
Something has to change!
In frustration, I went and poured myself my happy hour cocktail, and headed to my favorite seat on the patio, to start the next chapter of our book: Persistence – The 8th Step to Riches.
I only made it through 12 paragraphs. What Hill says here is nothing shy of brilliant.
“The starting point of all achievement is desire. Keep this constantly in your mind. Weak desire brings weak results, just as a small amount of fire makes a small amount of heat. If you are lacking persistence, this weakness may be remedied by building a stronger fire under your desire.”
“If you find that you are indifferent, you may be sure that you have not yet acquired the “money consciousness” that you must possess.”
If you don’t have a strong enough desire, you will procrastinate. Period!!
And the truth is, I’m finding myself indifferent. I know the degree of fire required. I’ve had it, a number of times. I don’t have it right now.
But, I’m in luck!!!! Hill has once again told me exactly what I need to do. I failed to follow the instructions the first time through.
Tomorrow, I will share these first 12 paragraphs of our next chapter in their entirety.
I promise you, if you wish to change, you won’t want to miss it …
Have a great weekend. Put a pot on to stew. I’m about to turn up the heat ….
