by Craig Harper
We've all heard the saying: "You don't know what you've got until it's gone."
A couple of short stories:
Story one. A few years ago I travelled to South Africa to do some work with one of my best friends who is the head of a charity which works internationally with children who suffer as a result of living in poverty. We travelled in and around the poorest parts of Johannesburg conducting a needs analysis to ascertain where the charity would focus it's energy, money, resources and time. Most of the trip was spent working with organisations (hospitals, orphanages, homes) who care for children who have the AIDS virus. Over the course of a couple of weeks, I saw hundreds of children, who through no fault of their own, had been given a death sentence. I hugged them, fed them and cried over them.
It was a life-changing and attitude-changing experience for me.
I saw a child who weighed two kilos (4.4lbs) at the age of two (who died the next day) and I met four year-olds who weren't going to make their fifth birthday. To say it was confronting and uncomfortable for me would be the understatement of the decade. So the white boy from his comfortable middle-class, privileged existence in Melbourne, Australia who had a periodic tendency to complain about how tough his life was, and who thought he had it all figured out realised that:
1. he didn't really know much at all
2. he had no (real) problems
3. he made his life harder than it needed to be and
4. he had absolutely no idea how great his life was or how ignorant he was.
Spend some time with kids with AIDS (or any terminal illness) and your perspective will change. I returned home and had a completely new appreciation for, and awareness of everything in my life; I realised I was genuinely privileged. I learned that my (few) challenges and hurdles were relatively inconsequential.
Nothing had changed, yet everything had changed.
Story two. I have a friend who is a Personal Development junkie. Books, seminars, CD's, DVD's, newsletters, affirmations on the mirror... and a life-coach (of course). He doesn't want to do well; he wants to be obscenely rich (his words). His life is pretty cool; great wife, loving family, good health, good career and lots of reasons to be happy. I'm not saying his life is without problems or challenges but in the overall scheme of things, there ain't a whole lot of hardship going on.
He's rarely happy.
Rarely satisfied.
Never enjoys where he is.
So busy striving and pushing towards his incredible future that he fails to see what he already has which is incredible.
One of the problems with some Personal Development students is that they are so pre-occupied with creating their amazing future that they don't really appreciate, or let themselves enjoy, their pretty-darn-good 'right now.' Considering that we live in the present and never in the future, it's a good idea to be able to enjoy the here and now (while still having goals and dreams for the future).
The truth is most of us have many reasons to be happy (now) yet we seem to have an amazing ability to find reasons not to be.
Story three.
Years ago I worked with a guy who has without doubt, one of the best wives in the world. She is one of the most loving, caring, generous, thoughtful people I've ever met. I always teased him about how she was too good for him and how one day, she would dump him for me. I was always surprised by how little he seemed to appreciate or acknowledge his wife's efforts. In fact I was astounded at how much he complained about so many things and how critical he was of her.
He was the 'big man' with the doting wife.
King of the Castle.
Master of his domain.
Idiot.
So one day the doting wife got up and left (not for me). And the King of the Castle turned into a blithering wreck. He begged, pleaded, cried and moped. For a long time.
She didn't come back for nearly a year. Needless to say, his attitude and behaviour had changed somewhat.
Five years down the track they're still happily together and he knows (and shows) how great his life is. Smart.
It's great to be driven to achieve our best life but it's also crucial that we learn to enjoy what we already have.
The time to appreciate things is when we have them, not when we lose them.
We've all heard the saying: "You don't know what you've got until it's gone."
A couple of short stories:
Story one. A few years ago I travelled to South Africa to do some work with one of my best friends who is the head of a charity which works internationally with children who suffer as a result of living in poverty. We travelled in and around the poorest parts of Johannesburg conducting a needs analysis to ascertain where the charity would focus it's energy, money, resources and time. Most of the trip was spent working with organisations (hospitals, orphanages, homes) who care for children who have the AIDS virus. Over the course of a couple of weeks, I saw hundreds of children, who through no fault of their own, had been given a death sentence. I hugged them, fed them and cried over them.
It was a life-changing and attitude-changing experience for me.
I saw a child who weighed two kilos (4.4lbs) at the age of two (who died the next day) and I met four year-olds who weren't going to make their fifth birthday. To say it was confronting and uncomfortable for me would be the understatement of the decade. So the white boy from his comfortable middle-class, privileged existence in Melbourne, Australia who had a periodic tendency to complain about how tough his life was, and who thought he had it all figured out realised that:
1. he didn't really know much at all
2. he had no (real) problems
3. he made his life harder than it needed to be and
4. he had absolutely no idea how great his life was or how ignorant he was.
Spend some time with kids with AIDS (or any terminal illness) and your perspective will change. I returned home and had a completely new appreciation for, and awareness of everything in my life; I realised I was genuinely privileged. I learned that my (few) challenges and hurdles were relatively inconsequential.
Nothing had changed, yet everything had changed.
Story two. I have a friend who is a Personal Development junkie. Books, seminars, CD's, DVD's, newsletters, affirmations on the mirror... and a life-coach (of course). He doesn't want to do well; he wants to be obscenely rich (his words). His life is pretty cool; great wife, loving family, good health, good career and lots of reasons to be happy. I'm not saying his life is without problems or challenges but in the overall scheme of things, there ain't a whole lot of hardship going on.
He's rarely happy.
Rarely satisfied.
Never enjoys where he is.
So busy striving and pushing towards his incredible future that he fails to see what he already has which is incredible.
One of the problems with some Personal Development students is that they are so pre-occupied with creating their amazing future that they don't really appreciate, or let themselves enjoy, their pretty-darn-good 'right now.' Considering that we live in the present and never in the future, it's a good idea to be able to enjoy the here and now (while still having goals and dreams for the future).
The truth is most of us have many reasons to be happy (now) yet we seem to have an amazing ability to find reasons not to be.
Story three.
Years ago I worked with a guy who has without doubt, one of the best wives in the world. She is one of the most loving, caring, generous, thoughtful people I've ever met. I always teased him about how she was too good for him and how one day, she would dump him for me. I was always surprised by how little he seemed to appreciate or acknowledge his wife's efforts. In fact I was astounded at how much he complained about so many things and how critical he was of her.
He was the 'big man' with the doting wife.
King of the Castle.
Master of his domain.
Idiot.
So one day the doting wife got up and left (not for me). And the King of the Castle turned into a blithering wreck. He begged, pleaded, cried and moped. For a long time.
She didn't come back for nearly a year. Needless to say, his attitude and behaviour had changed somewhat.
Five years down the track they're still happily together and he knows (and shows) how great his life is. Smart.
It's great to be driven to achieve our best life but it's also crucial that we learn to enjoy what we already have.
The time to appreciate things is when we have them, not when we lose them.
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