Enjoying a quiet night in, I was watching one of my favourite guilty pleasures when they said a quote that really stood out to me:
“You must give up the life you planned in order to have the life that is waiting for you.” – Joseph Campbell
I’m definitely someone who takes pride in planning everything to a tee, and it’s naturally what I do in my everyday job and volunteer work on the side. In order to do something well or pull off a great event, there’s months of planning every single detail that goes into the back end. Even when it comes to friends’ birthdays or weekend activities, I jump on every single chance to bring people together and bask in the happiness of making other people happy. Even though sometimes the stress of it all can get the better of me, I still keep coming back for more. I no longer fight it; it’s just what I do.
But hearing that quote, really made me pause and think for a second. After some googling, I came across a really well-written blog post that just drove the message home. The author of the blog supported this quote with 3 reasons why you shouldn’t let plans take over your life. Simply put, they were:
1. Plans replace meaning. - Focusing too much on the detail takes you away from seeing the bigger picture.
2. Life doesn’t go to plan. - You can have all of the life plans and goals as you want to drive you forward in your life and career, but you need to be flexible to change up the game plan if you need to.
3. You grow by letting things go. – This was the point that resonated with me the most, and for that, I am sharing with you exactly what they’ve written as it would not do it any justice if I tried to paraphrase into my own words.
“What you want now might not be what you want next year. And I very much doubt it’ll be exactly what you want ten years from now, or even five years from now.
Hearing what’s next in your life can be impossible when all you can hear is the hum from the plans you’ve made.
It’s easy to miss an intriguing, hidden path when your eyes are fixed on the map you drew before you left home.
Sometimes you gotta add things to your life to move it forwards, but other times it’s what you remove that allows your life to take shape. Letting go not only frees you up from your out-dated assumptions and rules, but it gives you strong, undeniable evidence of your ability to learn and grow.
It’s by letting go that you get the best shot at the life you really want.“
This speaks volumes to me and reminds me that letting go or changing paths once in a while is okay. Sometimes life moves so fast and quickly around us that we don’t have a second to step back to just spend some time on our own, to be alone with our thoughts. There’s always going to be something that needs to get done, something that needs your attention, but more and more I’m beginning to realize that I need to pay attention to myself too. Been having a bit of an off-day and couldn’t really put my finger onto why that was. I still don’t really know, but know that it’s just one of those nights I need to chill and be on my own.
Thanks for reading.
