You have goals.
You make plans.
And, then you LIVE...
This Summer has been full - full of great plans.
My son was home for college for a week. My cousin came to visit with her family. My mother-in-law got to live with us for a few months. I took my sons camping on the beach. My wife and I spent beautiful days in Florida. My one son went to Malaysia and is working and traveling Asia - and we talk via Facetime to share in his journey. My other son went to Cuba and had an amazing experience. We just spent a week half vacationing / have working at Myrtle. I went Rockfish fishing. My son and I are learning how to play golf, and getting out and playing...
And, the Summer is barely 6 weeks old!
We have ideas.
We set goals.
We make plans.
And, then we live.
Is it your goal to live in peace?
Do you plan to live with joy?
Do you plan for harmony?
We so often set goals for the activities in our life and we plan our whereabouts... how often do we plan for JOY?
We spent the week in Myrtle and had a beautiful week.
I had some amazing moments playing golf with my son on some gorgeous courses. The first question everyone asks is: "Oh my God, weren't you HOT? I couldn't plan golf in this heat (it's 95 and humid)."
To be honest... I never even considered the heat. It wasn't part of the criteria for my plans...
In my mind, I am thinking... It's late July in South Carolina... why would I expect anything other than heat?
To be honest, the fact that its hot made our experience BETTER because there were many fewer people on the course. Yesterday we went out on a gorgeous course, and we owned it... we didn't see another single body while we were out there.. it was AWESOME!!!
When my wife and I had our trip to Florida, it was a little cloudy and it rained a little bit... we enjoyed not having to put on as much sunscreen, and had fun rain bathing by the pool...
When the bugs come out camping, we spray ourselves with bug spray... and enjoy the amazing stars that are visible in the dark night sky.
People think that life and our plans should be like sex in the movies.
Real life always, or virtually always, is included or should be included in your plans.
I was talking to a person who had been here for two weeks and they were distraught by how expensive the trip was.
How often on your plans are you distracted by the weather, by traffic, by the occasional arguments that are likely to occur between family members... by some place you hoped to see being closed, by something on the trip being different than you expected...
By LIFE showing up and making your trip REAL and not an ILLUSION?
Magical moments are not perfect moments, they are moments of focus...
They are moments when we can turn down the noise of all that doesn't matter and focus on the ones that do... and narrowing our focus to the JOY in them...
You should think about what your goals are for "JOY"...
In our "magical" golf moments, the truth was that I was still slicing the ball, losing more balls than I care to admit... who cares!
In our "magical" moments, with my wife in Florida, the beach at the amazing place we stayed was unswimmable & in some ways even unattractive, and we had to spend more time by the pool... and it was hot... really hot... who cares?
I see so many people who plan these dream vacations and then are constantly distracted by reality coming along.
I see so many people who plan these vacations and expect reality to come along and dread them even before they take the trip.
Why set goals?
Why set plans?
If they are not a source for and a path to joy?
I have failed at many things in my life, but one of the things I feel like I am succeeding at is getting better and better at understanding what matters and focusing my attention there... and finding JOY in more moments.
Death helps.
I met a wonderful man over the past few years. He had a vision to bring better elderly care to Peru. He created this beautiful and amazing nursing home that he built an hour outside of Lima. The business concept did not work.
My mother was the ONLY person who signed up - in a compound built for hundreds of aging people.
Augusto Elias Benavides was his name.
He loved my mother. He befriended her. He took care of her. His desire to bring this concept to life was a passion, a life calling.
My mother was lonely being the only person there.
NOONE spent more time with her in the year she was there than he did. He would bring his family (young kids) to play with her on the weekends.
He would take my mother out with him on weekends, when he was going on outings with HIS family...
Here is a man who has invested his life's savings and more into a business concept that is failing... he set goals, he made plans... NOBLE plans to help and assist, and they were failing miserably...
And, he not only found JOY - he BROUGHT joy to my mother.... real meaningful joy.
When I would leave the compound (when I visited) - he would be the one staying behind. She would stay in his arms... trying to bring her comfort at my departures.
Two days ago in Lima, Augusto was killed during an attempted robbery. He was protecting his family. He was 34...
He was heading to vacation with his family.
His car broke down, and he got out to try to fix it.
And, then four strange men approached...
I am not saying plans have to be perfect... I am saying magical moments... moments of joy... are moments of gratitude. Moments of gratitude - where we are able to focus on what matters and be in it... be grateful for what matters being possible...
For our loved ones being healthy...
For living new experiences...
For being together...
For having the means to explore...
For being FREE...
For being ALIVE...
Some vacations do get ruined... when things that matter go wrong. But, we struggle to find JOY in the vast majority of vacations simply because they go from being dreams to being real... and reality, if we allow it to, pisses us off.
People sometimes ask me...
"Are you going on vacation, AGAIN?"...
And, I answer, "All of my life is a vacation."
And, I feel that.
Vacation is a state of mind that I try to visit daily...
If vacation is getting away from where we normally live to relax...
Why can't we do that in our heads with more frequency.
If vacation is going somewhere to find peace and joy and relaxation...
Why can't we do that during our normal day, by turning down the noise and all the stuff that doesn't matter...
And physically, I even get to go places as part of my normal and real LIFE... I am blessed.
We all make plans to travel, to vacation, to physically move ourselves from A to B....
Are you deliberate in making plans to travel to mentally move yourself from A to B...?
Because at the end of the day...
ISN'T THAT the real goal?
To experience JOY?
To LIVE MOMENTS of HARMONY?
Death helps...
not to take life for granted
not to take joy for granted
Rest in peace Augusto... my heart truly hurts for your wife and children...
You brought JOY and LOVE to many... You made a real difference.
Life is sometimes so imperfect.
And, the weather is so very irrelevant.
In harmony,
Nestor