How to find your true path in life, Pt. 2

....No, I think it's just Highway 101 N to the Oregon border.

Is this my true path??….No, it’s just Highway 101 N to the Oregon border.

AKA: “Elisa fumbles around looking for something meaningful to do in life: A multiple-series post.”

Part 1, where I talk about how Life Goals suck, is here.

These past few weeks, I’ve not been so on-top of my daily habits. I won’t even try to pretend I have good reasons, but I’m also not going to beat myself up for it. (I’ll do better this week.)

Instead, I want to say that I’ve been thinking this lately. I wish I’d thought of it myself:

NO is important if I want to single-mindedly carve out a path for myself in the world.

YES is important if I want to explore, open myself to new opportunities, and learn about others.

I used to be a YES person.

I know some people who are totally NO people. On the positive end, they use their NO’s to do their thing: spend time with family, make music, read a book.

On the negative end of NO, people use their NO’s to be misanthropic hermits who shrivel up in front of a TV and who are afraid to venture past their front yard.

What about YES people?

On the positive end of YES, people expand their minds, meet all walks of life, philosophize, and learn new past-times like basket-weaving or becoming a driving instructor.

On the negative end of YES, people are flighty, flaky, and work 10 jobs in 10 weeks. They never excel or learn the value of hard work, because they don’t give themselves time to learn. Sometimes, YES people are looking for something “easy,” like fast cash or a job where they don’t need to go through a learning curve.

I’d like to be more of a NO person. On a good day, I use my YES’s to expand my mind and feel excited about all the myriad possibilities out there. On a bad day, I use my YES’s to escape the reality of my life.

“I have to do my work, and it’s really tough. But you’re telling me that I can learn to square dance in just 2 hours, if I go right now? Sure, I’ll go!”

~ Me on a YES day that should have been a NO day

So, I didn’t work in my 3 daily habits because I was busy saying YES to everything last week.

I’m going to say NO this week. Most importantly, I have to say NO to myself.

~ NO I will not prioritize checking work email over meditation.

~ NO I will not prioritize my boss’ request that I supervise an event, when I didn’t even get advance notice for it.

~ NO I will not go grocery shopping instead of writing another draft.

~ NO I will not wake up stressed out because I haven’t finished a report that isn’t even due for 2 more days.

Is anyone out there a “no” person? Any tips for me?

XO,

Elisa

PS: Other Job-Related Posts:

January, 2014 – This is me describing all the reasons I wanted to quit my job in January, but hadn’t done it yet.

January, 2014 – This is the blog post I wrote called “How to Quit your job,” with 6 steps to take. It was based on interviews with a bajillion (OK, more like 12) people and reading a bajillion more internet articles on the topic (actually a bajillion), “How did you transition jobs?”

March, 2014 – I wrote yet another blog post on the emotional side of quitting my job.

PPS: Photo credit – moi.

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