Are you struggling or in the flow of life? Maybe this story can change your perspective.
Something caught my eye on a walk today. A no-more-than-half-inch worm, perfectly camouflaged (yet somehow I saw it), was struggling, alone and vulnerable.
I thought, “Look at him turning and groping along blindly in the hot sun. Would he even survive the day?” I felt sorry for him.
Then I stopped myself in mid thought. How do I know he’s struggling? I’ve never been an inchworm. Maybe this is just his life. And he’s living it fully in every moment. No judgment on his part to the hot sun or the rocks and grass he navigates around or over. He just IS. He is being an inchworm.
It made me ask myself: How often do I judge situations before I even understand or know the “truth?” And can there truly even be any “truth” when it’s all through my own personal filter?
I just completed Part 2 of Gratitude Training (There are 3 parts) and it’s teaching me to A. Show up and be the author of my life and B. To sit with the possibilities and not judge.
That is powerful if you choose to employ it. It allows you to live your life without succumbing to the stories we tell ourselves about literally every situation.
Those stories and judgments are on autopilot. Yet when we are aware of them, we can choose how they affect us.
Tell a new story.
My new story for that little worm is that he is waaaay more fully engaged in life than I have been, and I will use this to teach me to dig in and live my life in every single moment. Ups or downs. Inching my way along in gratitude, authoring my life to be one of joy, power and compassion.
And that is the key: We each get to CHOOSE every moment. Be aware of your thoughts, your stories, your judgments. They are why the stuff shows up in your life that you are seeing. Is it good stuff? Is it stuff you want? GREAT. If not, CHOOSE a new perspective. Yes, it’s that easy. It’s practice and like working out a new muscle. BUT YOU CAN DO IT. So, do it.
I call it the “drift and shift.” You drift into your old ways and patterns, then you become aware of it and you shift into your new way of being.
So go BE and DO and HAVE and watch for messages and inspirations like tiny inchworms along the way.
