I start every year focused on self-improvement. But this year, there’s a twist. On my bedside table is a book I’ve turned to again and again in the last few months. A Life of Being, Having and Doing Enough by Wayne Muller has helped me see self-improvement differently. I have to accept and love who I am and where I am first. And that has become my self-improvement project, my number one New Year resolution for 2012.
I knew from the very first paragraphs it was a book I needed in my life:
We have forgotten what enough feels like … We live in a world seduced by its own unlimited potential. We are driven by a presumptive grandiosity that any economic, social, or political limitations can seemingly be overcome with more speed or technology. But for us, as human beings, our limitations remain constant, eternal, fully intact. Rather than feeling large and omnipotent, our own very limited, human days are likely to feel more cramped, overgrown, and choked by impossible responsibilities. At worst, we feel powerless; no matter how strong our hearts, or how good or kind our intentions, each day the finish line seems farther away, the bar keeps rising, nothing is ever finished, nothing ever good enough. So we work and add and never stop, never back away, never feel complete, and we despair of ever finding comfort, relief, or sanctuary…
If this resonates with you, you’re not alone. I cried when I read it. For the last twelve years – ever since I started my own business – I have been unable to stop. To rest. To let go of the idea that at any given moment, I need to do MORE.
I had a very, very good friend who approached life very differently. He was successful, but he enjoyed that success, every bit of it, all the time. He was always teasing me, telling me to slow down, have fun. I needed to hear that. I needed him. And then, in October of 2011, I lost him. He lived every day as if it were his last and his best and in the end, that is what took him from me. In all my grief I’ve had to sort through where he went wrong, but I keep coming back to what he did right. He celebrated his life every day. In his memory, I mean to do the same.
So in 2012, I resolve to be more grateful. (For my family, for my beautiful daughter Maeve, for my friends – the greatest blessings in a very blessed life.) I will trust my inner voice. (It does not lie if I listen well.) I will accept my outward appearance. (I am so loved, exactly as I am.) I will make sure everyone I admire, love and look up to knows that I do, each and every time I see them. (It is not a given that I will see them again.) And I will accept compliments from others. (They are sincere. There are things I do well.)
Here’s to truly living – and truly loving – our lives in 2012.
