“Your complaints, your drama, your victim mentality, your whining, your blaming, and all of your excuses have NEVER gotten you even a single step closer to your goals or dreams. Let go of your nonsense. Let go of the delusion that you DESERVE better and go EARN it! Today is a new day!”
― Steve Maraboli, Unapologetically You: Reflections on Life and the Human Experience
Cited from Good reads.
GO EARN IT!
The cute little guy in the picture is a message to all of us. He is cute. He is beautiful in nature. He is working hard for himself and no one is helping him. There is no complaint box where he can put his complaints in. He continues to focus on the new day ahead of himself. I was born partially sighted, and have had a small learning disability. It has taught me that working hard and out working your benchmarks is necessary. I was full of emotion on this topic today. Allow me to go forward...
Life is hard. It can be. I have no fucks to give. What does that mean? It means I don't care how hard it is for me personally. I will do what I need to do, and not only do well, but also thrive. I used to be that type of person who whines. Complaining is noticing every obstacle as a problem, yet there's truth behind people using problems as opportunities. I have no fucks to give. I'm 45 and tired of the complaints.
The animal in the picture does not complain he works hard and makes a life for himself. All this talk about minimalism and how it is better is pure and utter crap, and that frugalness is bad. I got news for you. Frugalness is not bad. Being a miser without kindness in the heart is. Minimalism is fear, and mainly some consider it the new badge of honor. I call bullshit on it. Being a minimalist deviates from the concept of managing our larger resources. Most don't know how to manage wisely. They simply scrape off due to fear.
Minimalism. Let's not have a car. Let's not have anything in the hopes that will make us happy having nothing. That is nonsense from the standpoint that happiness has always been an inside job. All physical things are fleeting in nature. When we work hard and achieve fulfillment. It is not the object or house that we get. It is the process and internal excitement called fulfillment.
Having a good life is never the cash in the bank. It is not the objects in your home. It is about having options and taking risks.
Some minimalists can deviate from risk and it becomes fear and a person may contract and play it safe rather than take chances in life. They contract and live a life of fear rather than taking a stab at something. Rather than putting an effort forward.
You can debate as much as you want. I will hold my ideas as they are functional beliefs. A belief can be either empowering or disempowering. We have to question which category does it fall into?
Some people will not find everything to be a problem. You don't manage more by having less. You manage more by managing dollars, time, and resources that are used. If you want to chant and live in a cave by all means go ahead. No fucks to give here. If you are happy. Then I am genuinely happy for you. Where there's problems there is life. I'm not happy about it like the next person. It is what it is. That means accept what is there and be proactive about fixing and repairing things. It is about managing. You manage, and control your resources no matter how large the supply. The larger the supply. The larger the responsibility. Nothing wrong with responsibility if you can learn to manage it. That is the lesson. You can learn to take on responsibility and learn to manage.
The results have just come in. We all know it. Cash never buys happiness. No fucks to give here. People have been running the rat race and banging against walls. I am not here to offend anyone. I am here to lay it on the line.
I understand the great irony of focusing on life instead of stuff, yet there is an inherent fulfillment in the mere achievement of a thing. We just confuse things, and objects with our inner happiness and achievement. Gratitude is the way. One ounce of gratitude is powerful. We are confused between minimalism, management, and inner achievement.
Let me lead you with this story:
A man was spending time watching a butterfly coming out from its own cocoon. The creature pushed to break a small tiny hole, yet its own body could not burst through it. After a long push on his journey, it looked tired and exhausted from trying to break through.
The man who was slightly impatient thought it was a good idea to assist the butterfly, so with a small pair of shears, he decides make a small incision to open the cocoon. This would be releasing the butterfly. The butterfly’s body was very tiny and shriveled and its wings were all folded up.
He continued to gaze on in hopes that the butterfly would open up its wings and flap away happy. Nothing occurred. The butterfly could no longer fly. He had robbed the butterfly of its own hard work and experience. The fulfillment is in the completion not the prize of flight. The experience was robbed. The cocoon was minimized and the growth was too. He could have earned it. Ever have that feeling when someone robbed you of your experience?
The man out of his own kindness had failed to UNDERSTAND that the cocoons tight-ness and small efforts helped the butterfly in order to squeeze out, and that was nature’s way of teaching the butterfly growth and of strengthening its own wings by its own efforts.
If we decide to reduce the number of choices, and out of pure comfort we begin to think it's easy. Then we are assuming life will be easy we should rethink that. If we reduce the number of choices just because we want to save money rather than experience life then we really should consider what makes us happy. There is an upside and downside to it all.
Upside: More people and friends on facebook. Downside: Loneliness, depression and anxiety rising at an astronomical rate. Do you think the caveman had anxiety? Ask yourself that? He couldn't afford to. He was chasing his fucking meal. We are doing it to ourselves and don't even logically realize it. Anxiety disorders are the most common mental illness in the U.S., affecting 40 million adults in the United States age 18 and older, or 18% of the population. (Cited Source: National Institute of Mental Health)
Our very efforts is precisely what prepares us for the next obstacle to be faced. If we minimize our options we minimize our efforts. We minimize our learning. We stop our own experience. We stop our own ability to earn something that is hard and difficult, rather than easy and comfortable. If you refuse to make that effort, or gets the wrong sort of help, you could be left with harder times getting through with mere avoidance rather than experience. There is a fine line between restriction and expansion. We must learn both ideas. Pure restriction is minimizing. We must learn to expand sometimes. The concept of minimizing is teaching society to restrict everything. It is a balance, and a flow.
In terms of being a minimalist of your options. You could learn a lot by management of resources that is if you assume the responsibility and the accountability of your resources. If you have a lot of resources? Then you could learn to manage them wisely.
The upside of the idea: Comfort in living with less. Downside: Comfort brings a lack of growth. It also creates fear and contraction from taking chances in life. For fuck sake we can work hard and achieve things. Just keep your gratitude, love and manage those resources wisely. One step at a time. Small steps.
There is always a burden if you champion life. That is your fulfillment. The idea of overcoming fear rather than fear running the ship. It is no wonder why we have more anxiety now than before. Life can be simple, but not so simple. Every hear that phrase K.I.S.S.?
Keep it simple stupid? It insinuates the idea that I'm stupid, we are stupid, and what we are doing is stupid. I like to think people are smarter than that. If they just apply themselves to grow it will be tough, yet playing it safe is security. Security is never growth. Living small. Means living small. Living small means living with fear. Living with fear controlling you is not even living a life. It is living in the effects of life rather than the cause. Be the cause of your life. Learn, grow, shape, — all parts of life. Take a chance. Expand where needed and restrict where you need, but do it wisely.
YOU CAN LIVE IN THE EFFECT OF LIFE, OR YOU CAN BE THE CAUSE AND BE PROACTIVE IN ORDER TO TAKE CHARGE OF YOUR LIFE
It is who we are that is more important. Living small to be happy is a perception of not understanding what truly makes us happy. The answer is: FULFILLMENT. The feeling inside when you did it yourself.
Your greatest asset is your earning ability. Your greatest resource is your time. Brian Tracy
Sorry for the rant. Even though I don't know you. I still care about you all. Understand there is a fine line between minimizing and expanding. Life can beautiful just understand management is not always cutting away something. It is utilizing things more wisely rather than mere deprivation.
GO EARN LIFE!