I love the word, "preferences." I have learned that letting that word guide me has improved my quality of life to an almost unbelievable degree.
I used to think that there was a right way and a wrong way to do everything. I wasn't alone in this belief. I noticed that a large part of what people said to each other was pointing out that somebody was doing something "wrong." I certainly include myself in that.
After I began to become informed about some things that I had never known before, I realized that most of what I thought about "right" was merely a matter of personal preference. I had confused my preferences with "right."
I had been going through life noticing all the things other people were doing "wrong." It was my main thought process. Sometimes I pointed it out to them.
I began to notice when I was putting other people "under surveillance" I was one very unhappy person. It made me feel kind of righteous (which counteracted my internal criticism), but I mostly just felt grumpy. And one thing was definitely and for sure - other people really began to avoid me. Why would they not? I don't like hanging out with critics - why would they?
Here are some examples -
- I noticed that I didn't like how some people dressed. I thought they were doing it "wrong." Then I realized I just had preferences about clothing and that applying those to myself made me happy. Then it become very easy to ignore other people's preferences about clothes.
- I also discovered that I didn't like some kinds of cars, furniture, hair-dos, foods and on and on. Somehow I had decided that my "preferences" were the "right" ones and declared everyone else wrong. Oops! I did it again! The same solution applied - enjoy my own preferences and respect other people's preferences.
- When other people were not doing things "perfectly" (according to my definition of perfection), it annoyed me. For example, when my husband drove a different speed than I thought he should, I pointed it out. All my "back seat driving" habits did not improve our relationship.
- I learned that everyone has his or her own definition of perfection and that doing things my own way and shutting up when in the presence of someone doing something differently than I did, would improve my quality of life. For example, I stopped putting dishes away in the places I thought they should go when helping in someone's kitchen, and started asking where they kept them instead.
My focus on my own preferences and enjoying them certainly improves my quality of life. But being mentally peaceful instead of being on the alert for wrong-doing improves my quality of life even more. Most of all, my relationships with other people have improved and that's the best.
Somehow I came to believe that my life was mostly about just reacting to what came my way. I had vague notions of what I thought my life should be about, but a great deal of the time, I was reacting - reacting to what was going on around me, other people, and to my emotions.
The death of Nelson Mandela this past week, called to mind the opposite of reacting to life. He chose a life purpose - freedom for his people - and carried it into prison with him. He certainly had plenty he could have reacted to, but instead he chose to act in a strategic way - beginning with insisting that the prison guards call him Mr. Mandela or he refused to respond to them.
Of course, I'm not Nelson Mandela and I don't have a big life purpose that affects the world like he did. However, like every person, I have an opportunity to choose a life purpose and create the life I want. Most of the obstacles I will come in contact with are within me rather than outside myself. In order not to sleepwalk through life, just reacting to what's around me, I must take the time to consult my higher self and my higher power for direction.
"You can sleep when you're dead."
"Sleep deprivation is a spiritual practice."
"Important people don't sleep very much."
"Lazy people sleep too much."
"If you sleep as much as you want to, you're sleeping
too much."
For a lot of my adult life I believed that sleep deprivation was my badge of honor. I thought it communicated to others that I was so busy with important things that I didn't have time for mortal stuff like sleeping. Lack of sleep also made me feel like I was a little bit saintly.
Unfortunately, lack of sleep also made me feel cranky, frantic and unfocused. I used to fall asleep pretty much every time I sat down. Going to movies was a waste of time because I fell asleep within the first few minutes. I fell asleep at work after lunch. (I had to hide in the women's restroom.)
By the time I was in my 40s, I had so much sleep debt that it took me years to catch up when I finally made a commitment to sleep as much as I needed to.
I might never have given in if it hadn't been for a terrible wreck I had several years ago. I was pretty badly injured. As soon as I thought I could, I went back to work and kept my usual too-little sleep schedule.
Fairly soon I began to experience simply being unable to get out of bed in the morning. I used all the will power I could muster and I still couldn't get out of bed.
I missed a lot of important functions, and people were mad at me. I just had to deal with it - I really couldn't get out of bed. Finally I gave in and quit working.
I went to bed when I felt sleepy and got up when I was finished sleeping. For several years I slept a minimum of 12 hours a night and sometimes as much as 16 hours. It was frustrating.
But as soon as I started trying to exercise self-discipline by going to bed later and getting up earlier, I went right back to not being able to get up in the morning. So I would surrender again.
Finally I arrived at the point I am now - I go to bed around 9:00 p.m. and get up about 7:00 a.m. That's about 10 hours of sleep. It varies a little from day to day, but that's what I usually need to function.
If I'm more physically active than usual, I will usually sleep longer the next day. That's necessary for my well-being.
As far as I know, there is absolutely no virtue whatsoever in sleep deprivation - not for physical health, emotional and mental health, nor for spiritual growth. I'm against it.
So, besides going to bed when I was tired and getting up when I woke up, I also used sleep hygiene, relaxation exercises, guided meditation, and melatonin to regulate my sleep patterns.
Sometimes I wonder whether the world might not be a better place if everyone was getting enough sleep. Less crankiness, fewer wrecks, more productivity at work, fewer divorces (maybe more sex because people might actually have the energy), less child abuse, less conflict in general. Wow!
In order for me to have any idea what I really wanted for my life, I had to have at least an idea of who I really was. For a good part of my adult life I've been confused about the answer to that but didn't even know I was confused.
I had accepted what other people told me I was beginning with my parents, then my friends, then my spouse, then my children. It wasn't until much later that I realized that who I thought I was was an amalgam of other people's perceptions. Then I started reading books and taking personality tests.
Everything I learned was helpful. My favorite personality tests are Enneagram and the Myers-Briggs. I highly recommend taking them. They're fairly easily accessible on line. The part that interested me the most was that when I took them more than once, separated by a considerable period of time, they came out quite differently.
Personality tests made me think about how I really behaved, how I made choices, how I changed from one kind of situation to another. That was very helpful because I could also identify which situations were the most enjoyable and which were the least enjoyable.
Of course, personality tests were far from the only options for learning about myself. Some of the books I read suggested looking at magazines in order to identify what types of outdoor scenes stuck out to me and what type of interiors caught my attention. What seemed odd to me at the time, but doesn't any more, was that whether indoors or outdoors, I was strongly drawn to scenes that looked peaceful to me.
My attraction to peacefulness began to show up in my clothing choices - calm colors, clothes with no patterns. Little by little I began to change my surroundings in small ways to reflect my attraction to peacefulness.
After awhile I realized that peacefulness was what I wanted at the center of my life and for the foundation for my life. Then I had a real goal. Something that lifted my heart and gave me direction. The more I worked toward peacefulness as a goal, the more I loved my life.
Trying to roof a house before you're finished with the foundation is obviously futile. But I used to try to set goals and achieve them before I actually knew who I was and why I wanted to achieve those goals. I usually only put a few days of effort into working toward them before I gave up. No wonder. I was definitely trying to work without a foundation.
I finally realized that I was choosing goals that I thought I SHOULD choose instead of goals I actually wanted. I didn't actually know what I wanted either because I was so busy trying to be who I thought I SHOULD be. It had never occurred to me to ask myself who I was or who I wanted to be and what that person, whoever she was, would want for her life.
So...it was evident that I would first have to discover who I really was...
Step 1 - Discover who I really am (or who I really want to be). Oh boy! This is not as easy as it sounds. However, you can make room for a little time with yourself on a regular basis to ask yourself some questions, and you can gradually get acquainted with yourself. Make it a time when you don't have anything else you have to do or people you need to be with. You don't have to start with the big questions like, "What do I want my life to be about?" You can just start with making a list of things you love to do. Then make a list of things you love: like what colors, food you love. Check your closet and select your favorite clothes. This is a way to start getting better acquainted with yourself.
Step 2 - What do I REALLY want? Go ahead and make a list of the goals you think you should want to achieve. Now - notice that what you REALLY want is the feeling you would get from achieving those goals.
For example, I'd like to have a convertible. I've seen them on t.v. and in the movies. The people driving them look happy and carefree. (Except for Thelma and Louise driving off a cliff!) So what I really want is to feel happy and carefree. This exercise will help you separate the goals that give you the result you REALLY want, from the goals you think you SHOULD want.
I know I SHOULD lose weight. But the feeling I would have by losing weight is a feeling of accomplishment, looking better, and feeling better. When my goal is how I want to feel, I'm a lot more motivated than by a "should."
Step 3: Begin to add the things you love to your life on a daily basis.
Here's the easy part. The fun part. Start adding the stuff you love to your life. Don't spend a lot of money; just add the simple, easy things. Wear the clothes you love, eat healthy food you love, do some of the activities you love.
By making these changes you're telling yourself that you really are capable and ready to build the life of your dreams. You are building a foundation of self-knowledge and are learning what you really love - invaluable for moving forward.
As I've changed my focus in my personal life, my focus has changed a lot in my professional life. Right now I'm in a transition period as I work on discovering how to transition my professional focus from goal setting to more inner work for the purpose of creating the life of our dreams. More will be revealed.
I've never really dreaded getting older. I've always been short in stature and looked younger than I was. I attributed my perception that "I got no respect" (Rodney Dangerfield's joke), to being short and young, so I always wanted to be older than I was.
Now that I'm technically an "old lady," I've reached my objective - I'm finally "old enough."
I'm old enough to truly not care that I'm not sexy. I'm old enough to realize that getting enough sleep and general down time is vitally important. I'm old enough to know that my spirituality can come first. I'm old enough to know that prestige is pretty much worthless for happiness. I'm old enough to know that being busy is not the same as accomplishment. I'm old enough to know to realize that social convention will not bring me love.
Of course, it's too bad that I didn't know all that when I was 20, 30, 40, or 50. But I'm grateful that I've got it now!
