Don't Wait
When a golden opportunity comes knocking, don't wait. Don't give yourself a second to second-guess yourself. TAKE IT.
Each golden opportunity is a precious flowering of a unique mix of conditions that exists in this moment only – the energies you carry, the energies of those around you, the position of the sun, the moon, the planets, the stars. It's breathtaking how much needs to align itself for a golden opportunity to take form.
How many opportunities have you let pass, thinking they'd still be there, and then conditions rearrange themselves and the opportunity vanishes?
Every time we miss a golden opportunity out of indecision and fear, some part of us dies.
Consciously or subconsciously, we lose trust with ourselves. We disconnect with our souls (which manifested the golden opportunity for us in the first place), and we eliminate this cognitive dissonance by making up stories. Stories like – "Oh well, I didn't really want that in the first place…" or "I'm not capable/worthy/deserving of getting it or having it."
If we keep living like this, these self-limiting justifications turn into a hairball of confused thinking, emotional numbness, and even physical disease.
That's not the life I want for you, and it's not the life I want for myself.
I admit, I was getting stuck in that cycle myself of withdrawing from the beautiful intensity of life and rending myself incapable.
This morning I woke up at 5:30am inspired inspired to write an article. Rather than write it, I tried to go back to sleep, and ended up losing the delicate thread of inspiration back into the void.
I tried to meditate, take a bath, distract myself… but nothing would make me feel better. What is self-care in one context is distraction in another, and this morning my soul is calling me to CREATE, not rest. I needed to follow the call…
The good news is this: life is infinitely generous with giving us second (and third, and fourth) chances. Every time we miss a golden opportunity, feel the pain of regret, and make a commitment to dive back in, a new golden opportunity will arise.
In this case, I decided to pick up the thread right here and now (rather than trying to re-create a former reality that I missed).
This time I got right to my computer and started writing. I didn't make tea first. I didn't get my workspace perfectly arranged. I just jumped in. It's 7am. I haven't eaten breakfast yet like I usually do. But I don't care. I'm writing this damn article!
The moment I started typing, my inner critic started screaming at me – "What are you doing! This article sucks! You're wasting your time! No one's going to read this anyway!"
After a few minutes of struggle, I tossed the critic aside, took a deep breath, and kept writing.
Here's a simple tool you can use – it's called the 5 Second Rule. There's a whole book about it, but the essence is this:
When a golden opportunity presents itself and your gut instinct says "I want it," start counting down from 5 – out loud– and when you get to 1, ACT. These five seconds allow you a brief pause to collect yourself, but doesn't give you enough time to get in your own way. It's brilliant.
To bring ourselves back into alignment with our souls, we need to courageously live in the current of our hunger, our desire, our deep yearning to engage with LIFE – to give our love fully to this world in whatever form that may take – our work, our relationships, our purpose…
In the end, I believe our deepest fear is of life itself and its blazing beauty and intensity when we're fully open to the extraordinary possibilities that beckon us.
So take the leap today. Don't wait. When you know you want something, grab it and see where the path takes you.
In the words of Rainer Marie Rilke –
Let everything happen to you
Beauty and terror
Just keep going
No feeling is final.
With love,
Peter