Having the life of your dreams seems to imply that you need to have luck, doesn't it? That would be a terrific excuse for not having the life of your dreams, wouldn't it? "Oh poor me, I've just had such a horribly hard life!!!" If you're sitting here reading this, you are probably not living in a refugee camp fighting against starvation. You've got a really big head start toward having the life of your dreams compared to many people in the rest of the world. Luck is made by exercising gratitude - or at least that's what I believe and it's what works for me. It involves focusing on what I have, rather than what I don't have. And then focusing on how I can build on what I have to make more good things happen. Life is just life. In case you think you're the only one who has suffered tragedy, set backs, and tough times - look around. You are not alone and it certainly isn't necessary to suffer forever. I believe we were created to enjoy life, so let's get busy with joy!

THE Rules

It's a sad and frightening thing: We all have "rules." Quite a few of us believe that our rules are the only right ones and when other people don't follow them, we become self-righteously angry and outraged. Talk about barriers to having the life of our dreams!!! This is one is way bigger than the Great Wall of China. Sometimes I think that each person's rules are as individual as fingerprints. Then I think that surely there must be some that we all have in common. Maybe so, but they are very hard to find.

In the life of my dreams, I have joyful relationships with the people in my life. This is not going to happen if I try to impose my "rules" on them or if I assume I know what their rules are. It would make sense to ask people what their rules are, but often they think you are being obnoxious if you ask, because they assume their rules are the only right ones. It makes it tough to get along with them for sure. And, of course, I'm going to be tough to get along with if I think my rules are the only right ones.

We all seem to have rules about things from the little things of life to the huge things of life, but we rarely think about where our rules come from and whether we really believe in them. There are rules about how to hang the toilet paper, how to fold towels, how to manage a checking account, how money should be spent, how to divide money in a marriage, how to discipline children, how friends are supposed to treat each other, how much time should elapse before calling someone back, what should be posted on Twitter, how often we should have sex, who should do household chores, when kids should be allowed to date, if it's permissible to have 11 items in the line for 10 or less items at the grocery store. Then there are the nationwide and worldwide rules about how nations should treat each other, whether it's okay to lie about a product you're trying to sell, if it's okay to slant the truth about something to get votes, who you should and shouldn't have sex with and under what circumstances, and on and on.

Most of us seem to get pretty worked up about this stuff. Sometimes we get as worked up about how to hang the toilet paper as we do about how nations should treat each other. Divorces, getting fired from jobs, ending of friendships, and nasty wars could be traced back to conflicts in rules. In the life of my dreams finding some peace with all this is vital. So... What to do?

I believe the best place to start is to examine our own rules and ask ourselves where they came from and why we have them. We may want to modify them to suit our real values and cause them to conform with love and peace. Then we may want to tactfully and subtly find out what the people in our lives believe the rules are. As I said before, it would be wise to be extremely cautious since outright asking them may hit a nerve if they believe their's are the only right ones.

When I was going to college I had a business where I provided household chores for people who were unable or did not have time to do them themselves. Boy, did I ever find out about rules. Most people did not want to tell me specifically what they wanted done. They said things like, "Just do what you would do for yourself." Following those directions got me in a lot of trouble, because the way I did things was nothing like how they thought they should be done. But they thought everybody did things their way they did because - well, they thought their rules were the only right ones.

One guy became a customer when he bought a house from some people I had worked for for many years. He became angry with me because I did not use furniture polish on all the wood cabinets in the home. He said everybody knew that you should use furniture polish on wood cabinets. Well, the previous owners absolutely forbade me to use furniture polish on them because they were afraid it would get on the floor and make it slippery. Hmmm. And there was no way the guy ever believed that I was doing anything except trying to get out of doing what I should know to do without being told. So, I fired myself. People like that are just too hard to work for. Sometimes that's the best solution. As I gained more experience, I sometimes decided not to try to work for people who couldn't/wouldn't tell me what they wanted me to do.

Personal relationships are even more tricky. I was married for over 20 years to my soul mate. I can't even think of a way to explain how much we loved each other, admired each other and how much fun we had. I married him knowing he had traditional rules about the roles of men and women in marriage. Which I don't. We came to an uneasy truce before we were married with his agreement to do some (not very many, in my opinion) household chores. But he did my laundry as well as his own for the whole 20 plus years we were together. I think that in his heart he really thought he shouldn't have to be doing laundry - it was really my job - but he did it to humor me because he loved me. The fact that housework and cooking were never shared - well, I humored him in that because I loved him. We never did agree about how to handle money and the only way we survived that was to keep our money separate. But at least we did know what each other's rules were and learned to live with and compromise our differences. I don't think there are any other ways to deal with each other's rules. Changing the other person's mind is just not likely. I often wonder if this method would help in politics and in conflict among nations.

Procrastination, continued

One of the most exciting and empowering experiences I've ever had was finishing something I had been procrastinating on for a long time. I felt light enough to levitate to the tops of trees. I felt like a truly worthwhile human being. I felt powerful enough to rule the world (having overcome massive sloth). Try it. You will love it!

Procrastination

Procrastination is my middle name. I also have the middle name of persistence. Believe it or not, the two go together. Persistence offsets my natural way of being which is procrastination. It's a severe character defect but with the help of dogged persistence, I have managed to get a few things done in my life that were amazingly challenging.

In the process of dealing with procrastination, I've learned a few things that are helpful. One of the main reasons for procrastination is that whatever I'm procrastinating about isn't fun to do. That should be plain as day, but often isn't. It takes me awhile to admit that that is the problem. Then the only answer is to make it fun in some way. If it lends itself to a party, I can always invite friends over to help, order pizza and have a party. That's what I did when I needed to clean the soot off books I saved from a fire. I've never tried to have a party for help with taxes, though. I don't think there's a way to do it. But it does help for me to treat myself with a lovely reward as soon as I finish something difficult. In order to do that, I have to overcome the feeling that everyone has to do taxes, so I shouldn't need to be rewarded for doing what is clearly just the right thing to do and just reward myself anyway.

Another big reason for procrastination is that whatever action I'm not wanting to take is associated with taking up time that I would otherwise be using to do something enjoyable. (There's a pattern here - do you see it?) So, the first thing I do is make sure I don't eliminate something I love to do in favor of something I don't want to do. One of the things I used to LOVE to do was just sit and talk with my husband. We could do that for hours. I don't know that anyone else would have found our conversations entertaining, but we thought we were fascinating. It really is pretty easy to find slots of time when I wouldn't even miss the activity I do in that slot. Then I can fit the procrastination activity into that slot until it's done.

Of all the things that can derail the trip to the life of our dreams, procrastination is a big one. It's vital that we find ways to overcome it.

Goal Setting

After you've decided what you want in each area of your life, it's a good idea to pick only three or so to focus on. More than that can be overwhelming. It can be any three, just so you're sure they are things you REALLY want. The question to ask yourself is, "why don't I have these already?" By asking that question you'll discover what the barriers are to reaching these goals. Then for every barrier you think of, think of some actions you can take to overcome the barriers and put a date by which time you will have taken the action. A BIG KEY then is to look at these every day when you make your to-do list. (You do make a to-do list, right?)

Example:

Focus Goal: I want to weigh 145 lbs by October 30.
1. Barrier - I hate diets. I feel hungry all the time.
- Action step (by August 31) Research and try food plans that address hunger problems.
2. Barrier - I eat whatever is available when I'm hungry - often eating high calories snacks.
- Action step (by August 31) Set aside time once a week to buy healthy, low-calorie snacks and package them for the week.