When you consciously choose to let go of the way it “should” be, you free your mind to deal with

life’s
unexpected changes, challenges and chaos in the most effective way possible…

You create space for acceptance, learning and growth.

You learn from your mistakes and the mistakes of others.

You see the world through an unbiased set of eyes.

And gradually, you allow yourself to step forward with a clear and focused mind.

It's all about accepting what is, letting go of what was, and having faith in your journey.

Closing the door, completing the chapter, turning the page, etc. – it doesn’t matter what you title it…what matters
is that you find the strength to leave in the past those parts of your life that are over, so you can better attend to
the present.

What has happened is uncontrollable; what you do now changes everything!

Of course, knowing this and actually living a lifestyle that reinforces this truth are two very different things. Letting
go – changing the way you think – is NOT easy; it’s a journey that is traveled one day at a time.

It can be excruciatingly difficult to leave a long-term life situation behind, even when your inner-wisdom tells you
that things aren’t right and that it’s time to let go. At this point, you can choose to let go and endure the sudden pain
of leaving behind the familiar to make way for a new chapter in your life, or you can stay and suffer a constant,
aching pain that gradually eats away at your heart and mind like a cancer… until you wake up one day and find
yourself buried so deep in the dysfunction of the situation that you barely remember who you are and what you
desire.

Choose wisely!

Things will happen that are unexpected, undesirable, and uncontrollable. But you can always choose to take the next
tiniest step. Be brave and take it…

Choose to make mistakes, learn from them, let go of them, and move along.

Choose to think better about the past and present, so you can consciously make the best of the rest of your life.

Once upon a time there was a woman in her mid sixties who noticed that she had lived her entire life in the
same small town. And although she had spent decades enthusiastically dreaming about traveling and seeing
the world, she had never taken a single step to make this dream a reality.

Finally, she woke up on the morning of her 65th birthday and decided that now was the time! She sold all of
her possessions except for some essential items she needed, packed these items into a backpack, and began
her journey out into the world. The first several days on the road were amazing and filled with awe – with
every step forward she felt like she was finally living the life she had dreamed.

But a few short weeks later, the days on the road started taking a toll on her. She felt misplaced and she
missed the familiar comforts of her old life. As her feet and legs grew more and more sore with each new
step, her mood also took a turn for the worse.
Eventually she stopped walking, took off her backpack, slammed it on the ground, and sat down beside it as
tears began streaming down her cheeks. She stared hopelessly down a long winding road that once led to an
amazing world, but now seemed to lead only to discomfort and unhappiness. “I have nothing! I have nothing
left in my life!” she shouted out loud at the top of her lungs.

Coincidentally, a renowned guru and life adviser from a nearby village was resting quietly behind a pine tree
adjacent to where the woman was sitting. When the woman began shouting, the guru heard every word and
he felt it was his duty to help her. Without thinking twice he jumped out from behind the pine tree, grabbed
her backpack, and ran into the forest that lined both sides of the road. Stunned and in complete disbelief, the
woman started crying even harder than before, to the point of near breathlessness.

“That backpack was all I had,” she cried.” And now it’s gone! Now everything is gone in my life!”

After about ten minutes of much-needed tears, the woman gradually collected her emotions, stood up again
and began staggering slowly down the road. Meanwhile the guru cut through the forest and secretly placed
the backpack in the middle of the road just a short distance ahead of the woman.

When the woman’s teary eyes fell upon the backpack, she almost couldn’t believe what she was seeing –
everything she thought she had just lost was once again right in front of her. She couldn’t help but smile
from ear to ear. “Oh, thank heavens!” the woman exclaimed. “I am so grateful! Now I definitely have what I
need to continue onward…”

REMEMBER:

As we journey through our personal and professional lives, there will inevitably be periods of incredible
frustration and despair. During those tough times, it will sometimes appear to us that we’ve lost everything,
and that nothing and nobody could possibly motivate us to move onward in the direction of our dreams. But
just like the woman who stumbled across the guru, we are all holding with us a backpack of support that
comes in many forms – it can be a simple email or text message from someone we respect, inspiring blog
posts, insightful books, helpful neighbors, and so much more.

When we are feeling discouraged and demotivated, our opportunity is twofold:

 To recognize and appreciate our backpack of support – our external sources of motivation – before a
random guru (or someone with far more crooked intentions) has to steal it from us so that we can
finally see what we have always taken for granted.
 To be present and tap into our own hearts and minds – our internal sources of motivation – which
have the power to push us back up on our feet and guide us down the road to our backpack of
support, even when it appears to be lost forever.

No matter your circumstances, you always have what you need to take the next smallest step.

As Epicurus so profoundly said, “Do not spoil what you have by desiring what you have not; remember that
what you now have was once among the things you only hoped for.”

Be mindful. Be present.

Keep going.

One small step at a time.

Letting go of control… and being OK with it.

That is one of the greatest struggles many of us deal with on a daily basis, myself included.
Because letting go of control goes directly against our modernized, industrialized way of living – we are go-
getters, doers, architects of our destiny. We build things and make things happen on our own terms; we
don’t wait for anything to happen on someone else’s terms! At least that’s what I learned growing up from
teachers, sports coaches, movies, songs, magazine articles, and so forth. So allowing things to happen was
not in my DNA. I had never been one to sit back and passively let go of control.

Over the years, however, my perspective has shifted. I've grown mentally stronger, even as I’ve learned the
hard way that a great deal of the control we believe we have over our lives is an illusion. For example,
I’ve since met…

 the young man who had his life turned upside down by cancer
 the young woman, and mother of two, who lost her husband to death at 27
 the family who lost their house in a tornado
 the local business owner who was thriving until the economy collapsed
 the hard-working employee who lost her job when her employer of 25 years filed for bankruptcy
 the runner who lost his leg in a hit an run car accident
 the mom whose son has Down syndrome despite her doing everything right during pregnancy
 and many, many more people just like them…

It happens every day – situations we think we have control over, but we really don’t.

So what can we do?

The only choice we have: Let go, and be mindful…

And although it sometimes takes a great deal of mental strength to do so, we CAN strengthen our minds
gradually with practice…

In the game of life, we all receive a unique set of unexpected limitations and variables in the field of
play. The question is: How will you respond to the hand you’ve been dealt? You can either focus on the
lack thereof or empower yourself to play the game sensibly and resourcefully, making the very best of every
outcome as it arises, even when it’s heartbreaking and hard to accept.

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, the mind is our biggest battleground. It’s the place where the
strongest conflict resides. It’s where half of the things we thought were going to happen, never did happen.
It’s where our expectations always get the best of us. It’s where we fall victim to our cravings to control the
uncontrollable. And if we allow these thoughts and cravings to dwell in our minds, they will succeed in
robbing us of peace, joy, and ultimately our lives. We will think ourselves into deep heartache and even
depression.

Truthfully, there’s so much about life that we can’t control, it makes no sense to waste all our energy on
these things and then blatantly neglect everything we CAN control.

We can choose how we spend our time right now. We can choose gratitude and grace. We can choose whom
we socialize with – whom we share this day of our lives with. We can choose to love and appreciate the
people in our lives for exactly who they are. We can choose to love and appreciate ourselves too. We can
choose how we’re going to respond to life’s surprises and disappointments when they arise, and whether we
will see them as curses or opportunities for personal growth.

Busyness!

Think about it…

“I’m busy!”
How often is that your excuse?

It used to be my excuse every single day. My schedule used to leave me zero time for unplanned presence and
awareness.

And I was proud of my busyness. I wore it like a badge!

I wanted to remind everyone how tough I had it. I wanted everyone to know how driving from place to place to place
in my comfortable Honda was a huge pain in the butt. Not to mention how Marc and I would have to juggle business
and family. Helping our course students and readers, and then immediately rushing out to the grocery store? Don’t
even get me started! And then only having an hour to get our son fed and bathed before bed each night, so we could
get him down on time and prepare for the next day…

“Didn’t you hear me? I am super busy, everybody! Keep this in mind, and have mercy on me! Please!”

Yes, that’s exactly what I used to want you to know about me…

But not anymore.

Now I actually pause, just to be and breathe. And I’m proud of it.

Here’s the thing: Busyness is NOT a badge of honor. There’s no honor at all in busyness.

Busyness is just an illness that makes everything harder than it has to be.

Busy for the Sake of Busy

If we’re not below the poverty line, juggling three jobs at once just to put food on the table, then our busyness is
self-inflicted 98% of the time (the exception being that 2% of the time that a random series of incredibly difficult life
events blindsides us).

I finally got a handle on my busyness when I studied it long enough to realize that, yes… my busyness was within my
control. In fact, most of the time I actually created hurry and worry where none really existed. On any normal
weekday, you would have found me running around begging family, business associates, and basically everyone
nearby to move faster…

“If you don’t finish eating, we’re going to be late!”

“If we don’t get this task done in the next hour… we’re never going to hit our target!”

The funny thing is, whether I provoked everyone around me to move faster or not, we always collectively moved at
about the same pace anyway. But when I provoked them, everyone (including myself) was unhappier.

It became crystal clear to me that nearly all of my busyness was an overreaction in my head. I was manufacturing it
in hopes that it would create urgency in others, and somehow make my life easier. Instead, it did the exact
opposite—my busyness only created anxiety, bitterness and complexity. And even on days when there really were
lots of things to do, it was typically due to an overbooked schedule I had personally (and mindlessly) created.
All of this got me thinking:

Why in the world am I voluntarily making my life harder, busier and unhappier than it has to be?

The Reason and Answer for Needless Busyness (and Misery)

Sadly, a big part of the reason we fill our lives with needless busyness has to do with the always-connected, always-
sharing, always-comparing society we live in.

We default to defining ourselves based on where we are and what we have in relation to everyone else.

If we don’t have a “better” career, house, car, or pair of shoes, we feel inferior. And the only way we can possibly do
better, is to be busier doing… whatever! After all, we are what we do, right? Job title, employer… Aren’t these
typically the first things we share with strangers we meet at parties?

We fill our Instagram, Facebook and Snapchat feeds, and our calendars, with manufactured busyness to avoid just
being exactly who we are, exactly where we are. In the process, we not only miss out on the serenity and beauty
that exists within ourselves, but we also miss out on experiencing that same serenity and beauty in the world around
us, because our busyness has buried it with “hurry” and “worry,” and the endless need to be somewhere else, doing
something else, as fast as feasibly possible.

Ready for a positive change in your life?

Join me, and let’s start mindfully letting our needless busyness and stress GO!

Let’s start CHANGING THE WAY WE THINK about all the things we "should" be doing, so we can start doing the right
things, and actually live better lives.

Let's start embracing the fact that when we THINK BETTER, we LIVE BETTER!

All too often we let old rejections and failures dictate every present move we make. This is one of the most
common and damaging habits we as human beings succumb to.

Realize this!

Practice noticing your negative attachments to past experiences, so you can learn from these experiences and
then update your belief system based on how your circumstances have changed (as they continuously do).

In other words, you need to practice thinking better about the past (and present), so you can ultimately live
better from here on out.

One of the most effective ways of doing this involves catching and correcting your negative (false) pattern-
matching tendencies. Let me explain…

Every day, all day, you are subconsciously matching patterns from the past with the present (this is why
you’re able to recognize familiar places and people). When an experience in your life has emotional
significance, it gets tagged in your brain as being important. And when the emotional experience is
upsetting, it triggers your brain’s fear mechanism, which tells your brain to remain on the lookout for any
future conditions that vaguely remind you of this upsetting experience (it does this to protect you from
future harm).
Your brain then tries to match new experiences with the original one. But depending on how emotionally
attached you are to the original experience, it can lead to false pattern matches which inevitably lead you
astray. This is especially true when it comes to personal failures and rejections.

For example:

 Your relationship fell apart, so now you believe that all your future relationships will too.
 You got a really low score on a written exam in high school, so now you doubt your ability to take
any form of written exam.
 You didn’t get along with an old boss, so now you have trouble respecting a totally new boss or
different authoritative figure.

Again, these false pattern matches occur whenever you respond negatively and over-emotionally to a
particular past experience. And it all happens subconsciously too. Logically, you know that all relationships
are completely different, but emotionally you are inclined to respond as if they are all alike.

If you feel stuck because you can’t move beyond a negative experience from the past, then your brain is
subconsciously relating to it as if it’s still happening right now, which means it’s matching patterns
improperly in the present. Just bringing awareness to this phenomenon is the first step forward. Remember,
knowledge is power!

1. Subconsciously seeking approval from everyone around you.

Some people love to stir up controversy and drama for no apparent reason. Don’t buy into their propaganda.
Instead, imagine what would happen if you spent this entire day, and every day hereafter, with all your energy
directed toward your most positive possibilities. Rather than being annoyed, be amused. Instead of getting angry,
become curious. In place of envy, feel admiration. Life is too short to argue and fight for the approval of those who
can't be pleased.

Stop focusing on them, and start focusing more on YOU.

Believe in yourself and your ability to succeed. Believe in your intuition, especially when you have to choose
between two good paths. Believe that the answers are out there waiting. Believe that life will surprise you again and
again. Believe that the journey is the destination. Believe that it’s all worth your while. Believe that you are confident
enough to see it through, without everyone's approval.

2. Disempowering yourself with weak self-talk.

“Why me? Why me?”

That's the kind of self-talk that holds so many of us back.

What we need to be thinking is, “Why not me? And why not NOW?”

But, again, so many of us feel like we have to wait: to be hired, to be good enough, to be chosen—like the old
Hollywood cliché, to somehow be “discovered.”

Discover yourself!

What you’re capable of achieving from this point forward is not a function of what happened in the past, or what
other people think is possible for you. What you’re capable of achieving depends entirely on what you choose to do
with your time and energy starting now.

In every situation you have ever been in, positive or negative, the one common thread is YOU. It is your
responsibility, and yours alone, to recognize that regardless of what has happened up to this point in your life, you
are capable of making choices to change your situation.

And it all starts with changing the way you think about it.

When you think better about your circumstances, you are able to live better in spite of them.

“Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication.” Leonardo Da Vinci once said that, and I don't think anything
could be closer to the truth.

But how can we bring more simplicity into our complex lives? How can we uncomplicate things for
ourselves?

It's time for a reality check...

Life is actually pretty simple, but we insist on making it complicated!

Here are a few easy ways to uncomplicate it:

1. Learn from the past, and then get the heck out of there! – Past mistakes should teach you to create a
wonderful future; not cause you to be afraid of it. Don’t carry your mistakes around with you. Instead, place
them under your feet and use them as stepping stones. Never regret. If it’s good, it’s wonderful. If it’s bad,
it’s experience. Success is not about where you are standing at any given point in time; it’s about how much
you’ve learned and how far you’ve come to get there.

2. Focus on being productive, not being busy. – Don’t just get things done; get the right things done.
Results are always more important than the time it takes to achieve them. Stop and ask yourself if what
you’re working on is worth the effort. Is it bringing you in the same direction as your goals? Don’t get
caught up in odd jobs, even those that seem urgent, unless they are also important. Identify what’s most
important to you. Eliminate as much as you possibly can of everything else. No wasted time, no fluff, no
regrets.

3. Organize your space. – Start clearing clutter. Get rid of stuff you don’t use and then organize what’s left.
Keeping both your living and working areas organized is crucial. If you have a cluttered space, it can be
distracting and stressful. A clear space is like a blank canvas, available to be used to create something great.

4. Be efficient. – Stop being inefficient simply because you’ve always done it that way. If you keep doing
what you’re doing, you’ll keep getting what you’re getting. Many times we live with unplanned, complex
systems in our lives simply because we haven’t given them much thought. Instead, streamline your life by
finding better ways of handling common tasks. Focus on one system at a time (your cleaning system, your
errands system, your paperwork system, your email system, etc.) and try to make it simplified, efficient, and
logical. Then, once you have it perfected, stick to it.

5. Let things be less than perfect. – Smile every chance you get; not because life has been easy, perfect, or
exactly as you had anticipated, but because you choose to be happy and grateful for all the good things you
do have, and all the problems you know you don’t have. You must accept the fact that life is not perfect, that
people are not perfect, and that you are not perfect. And that’s okay, because the real world doesn’t reward
perfection. It rewards people who get GOOD things done. And the only way to get GOOD things done is to
be imperfect 99% of the time.

Is this email your wake up call to a simpler life?

How many times have you thought “this isn’t working” or “something is not right” or “things have to
change”? – those thoughts and words are from your inner voice. It's your wake-up call calling.

You don't need a major life crisis to wake you up. And no one needs to tell you because you already know.
Your inner voice has been trying to tell you, but in case it's been a challenge to find time and space to listen
through the chaos, maybe you'll resonate with one of these situations.

 If your life is on auto-pilot, this is your wake-up call.

 If you never put yourself first, this is your wake-up call.
 If you've become someone you don't recognize to please other people or to chase some version of
success that doesn't resonate with you, this is your wake-up call.
 If you are constantly numbing out with food, shopping, booze, TV, or other distractions, this is your
wake-up call.
 If you are worn down, beat up, stressed out, and completely depleted, this is your wake-up call.

Getting your wake-up call is not the hard part, answering the call is. Choosing to answer the call instead of
ignoring it is hard. Right now, it may feel easier to keep going, and going, and going. But you know if you
don’t find a way out of the endless cycle you’re in, it’s going to get worse.