Are you living for someone else?

Sometimes, it is difficult to understand ourselves. We do not even seem to know what we want all our lives. We never seem to ask ourselves this simple question .....

"What do I really want in my life?"

If we do ask, then, we never bother with the answer or answers. We are just too busy to see the truth. We are too busy to live up to other's expectation to even care whether we are really happy with what we are doing. In short ..... we are all like that 'Mr. Chen' in the previous post.

We are living for someone else. We are helping other people to achieve their dreams, but ours? We helped other to make decisions, but never ourselves. We are living to please others, but not ourselves.

It is really great to be able to please others. However, we also need to please ourselves. Our lives should not be ....."Everyone should like and approve of me if ...............". Because if so, we are ruining our own lives for the sake of others.

We damage our self-esteems in the long run. We will feel guilty, inadequent and start to blame others what we do not have. As we spent so much time in living for someone else, we have very little time and energy to invest in ourselves.

Are you living for someone else? Are you happy in doing so?

Is the responsibility yours?

"There are two primary choices in life: to accept conditions as they exist or accept the responsibility for changing them." Denis Waitley

There is an acquaintance, a Mr. Chen. He was born in a family with good background. From young, he lived his life as defined by his parents. Mr. Chen, who grew up to his father's expectation, had no real purpose of his own. He was grateful to his father who had prepared everything for him. So, in order to please his father again, he married the daughter of a wealthy family. That made his proud father even prouder.

For years, Mr. Chen lived in his wife's shadow. She had so many purposes in life. He had not. He went through 30 years of marriage doing things for her. He complaint little and did nothing to improve himself. He envied his wife for being able to do so many things she wanted. When Mr. Chen's wife died last year, his world crumbled. He lost all the force that drove him on throughout the years. He lost his 'purpose' to hang on to life because he did not have one. All day, he mumbles to himself. He seems to be angry with everything and everyone. He looks like a 70 year-old man instead of 50.

That is a sad way to end a life, especially when you have lived that long.

So, get up ...... do not be another Mr. Chen. There are too many Mr. Chens in this world, anyway.

You have the responsibility to change yourself. If you do not have a purpose now, define one. If it does not sound ideal, redefine it .... because if you have a life purpose, nothing will tumble you! Make the changes now so that you would not have any regrets later.

Redefine Your Purpose

In one of my previous posts, I mentioned about setting a new purpose. Maybe you will have doubts about this.

However, take time to read through the reasons in this list. If you check more than four reasons, you will know what to do!

• Something is missing in my life.
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• I don't feel joy in all I do.
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• I dislike my present job, but I have other no options.
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• I want to start something new, but I just don't have the courage to do so.
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• I can contribute more than I do now.
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• I have been spending so much time doing 'what I should' and not 'what I want'.
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• I have been busy doing someone else's work.
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• I always compare myself to others.
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• I feel bad when I see others being more successful than I am.
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• I always try to make things happen rather than to allow things happen.
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• I don't know what to look for, although I know I lack something
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• I'm not happy although I seem to have everything.

Not being happy and satisfied can cause stress and depression. If you know you need to do something about it, this is the time.

Hiding behind so many masks is not a good way to be yourself. I have decided to redefine my purpose. I have tried to unmask myself, layer by layer and by doing so, I know I'll reach my purpose easily.

Why Hiding Behind Masks

Most of us are not really living because we care too much of what others think of us. We always want to please them. We always try to explain what we are doing. In the end, we live as who they want, not who we are supposed to be.

Growing up, many of us did not get to choose what we wanted to be. We had to follow what our parents or families wished us to be. We had to give up dreams, just to satisfy them in order to cause fewer problems for ourselves. We had given up the rights to make decisions for ourselves once, why must we do it again?

Consulting others’ opinions and consulting others to receive approvals are different from each other.

We consult someone’s opinion after making a decision. We have already decided to take the risk. We will take the action even if the feedback is not favourable.

Asking for approval means we are ready to listen to the answers and have not decided yet. If the answers are unfavourable, we will not do anything. This also means we allow others to have a say in our lives. The sense to please others is so great here that we eventually feel paralyze by all the comment others made. We cannot afford to make another step forward and this is a disappointment.

When we have a disappointment, we tend to hide behind a mask. There will be more and more disapointments and then, our masks keep changing. All our entire lives, we have hundred if not thousands of masks. We hide all our feelings behind them, even joys!

When we finally can do something for oour very own, we found that we have lost the courage .... and all those masks cannot help us anymore!

Rediscovering Your Skills

Like I mentioned before, skills are acquired. Even if you do not know what your talents are, you can still learn skills. A skill is a competency as a result of years of training, experience and education. Anyone can have dozens of skills. Even fixing a small light bulb in the kitchen is a skill!

Some skills are also gifts or talents. Carpentry is a skill for some, but for someone who has artistic abilities, carpentry comes easily. He makes beautiful things with his skill and talent. Some children learn music when they are very young. All parents hope to bring out the musical talent in their children. However, not all children are gifted this way. Some can move gracefully eventhough they may not be able to play any musical instruments. Some are able to sing well, in fact very well after some music lessons ..... these are talents and skills blended together.

Some people have to work very hard in order to get their skills right because they are not gifted. However, due to their hardwork, these skills bring them success and recognitions.

List down your skills now. There are many which you many not remember that you have. These including cooking, cleaning, gardening and even raising children. You can also include some interpersonal skills such as listening, asking questions, motivating, persuading and so on.

List your skills in these categories:

Domestic

Business

Interpersonal

Sel Management

Recreational

You may be able to add more to your list as time goes by.

Rediscovering Your Talents

We are all blessed with specific gifts or talents. These abilities are very natural with us. These gifts can be our life purposes that would help in fulfilling our beliefs about ourselves.

Some of these gifts are: musical talents, athletic ability, ability with numbers, sense of humour, taste buds, artistic abilities, etc ......

Yet, during our growing up years and then the busyness of building our new lives, we seem to have lost touch of these abilities.

Actually, nobody has only one specific gift. If you are a person with a good sense of humour, then you may also be someone who has ease with people, one who makes friends easily with a cheerful and merry outlook. These are talents in their own rights. Not everyone has the same abilities. Another person with a good sense of humour maybe blessed with a flair in languages, diplomacy and so on.

Let me rephrase .... these talents or special gifts are actually your signature in other people's lives. These talents has made you unique. They give people some impressions about you. Most people remember us what what we did, or do. They do not really recognise us physically, but they recognise our talents.

Check yourself today. Take time to think about your talents or gifts.

New Purposes

We all live with many sets of purposes in our minds. We have lots of things we want to do before the sun sets every day. It is important to have clear purposes.

Many people live day to day, without a real purpose. Is there something to look forward to today?

We lost our sense of directions when we recovered from a major blow in our lives. We just do not know where to head to. We seem to forget that we still have the talents and gifts. We seem to forget that we all have acquired skills before all the unhappy events happened. We have forgotten that we still have families and friends who care enough to help us through.

Search in your heart, what was your passion before the unhappiness? Why must you let the unhappy event take over your passion? Can you somehow rekindle the passion?

Do you know how compelling passion is? It is able to to create that urgency in you that separates you from the external events of your life. Passion also allows you to live with a sense of purpose! You will be truly alive!

If you somehow cannot rekindle the passion as it may be linked to a painful experience, then, creat a new passion. Be renewed! Have new purposes to live!

Fit in

It is difficult to fit in a day with nothing interesting to do.

Maybe you can start by sorting out the clothes in your closet, or even the documents lying around the house. Maybe it is time to learn housekeeping again after so long. What about the garden?

Focusing on something to do will take your mind away from unwanted thoughts. You will feel energetic again.

If you need to avoid your friends and neighbours who don't seem to understand you, then don't bother to talk to them. There is no rule that says you must announce everypersonal event to others, not even to your family. If you need the privacy, get it yourself, nobody is going to leave you alone.

It is always difficult to fit in a family if you have nothing to do. You will feel that you are wasted and not contributing. You are afraid what others will say. That's when you feel depressed. You start to feel that everyone is giving you the pressure to achieve something. You can even hear them whispering about you behind your back. (The truth is, nobody does that!)

Get all the rest you need the first few days. Some go for a short vacation. Some prefer to stay at home, minding his or her own business. Nobody can tell you what to do. It is all up to you.

Then, maybe it is time to re-live yourself again. At the juntion, choose a road you want to go. It may be difficult, but if you focus on the solutions, there should be problems at all.

Learn A New Skill

Skills are acquired, not born. That's my principle.

I remember a few of my former retired colleagues signed up for computer classes the week after their retirement. Sad to say, they did not attend any of the classes eventhough they paid for them. I did not ask as that would seem impolite. Someone realted to me that these 'senior citizens' as they called themselves were burned out. I did not believe that.

In one of my macro photography classes, there is a 'senior citizen' too. He is almost 70. He bought a low end digital camera and attended my classes faithfully. He even follows us to many outings in the parks around the city. He makes it a point to show me his work. I know he is proud of his results. I am proud of him, because he has found a skill. He told us the other day that he has taken a few pictures of his grandchildren. His family displays the pictures all over the house. He is now a proud owner of a new DSLR which he does not know how to operate! A gift from his children as a graduation gift.

My father reads a lot of books on health after his retirement. He buys books and even goes to secondhand bookshops to get these books. He is forever excited with his treasures. I also wish that these books are in English Language so that I can also read them ...... Now, he has plenty of time to read them and to put them in practice.

My mother is already a very good cook. After her retirement, I can say .... she cooks better. She can even cook any food by just looking at the name! She has of course, a great collection of recipes!

There is never an end to all one can do ......... Start living again.

Wake Early

I think the best way to start your day is to wake early. Look out your window and take a deep breath of the morning fresh air.
It would be better if you can even see the sun rises. It always fills me with a new hope for that day.
Join in the morning walk or exercise with your neighbours. They are always there, weekends and weekdays.