Flow over force (the hustle-free mindset)

It may not seem like it but trying to take a photo of yourself while waving your hand is really hard.  It’s been a minute since I last posted so I thought I would say hi. Yes, I’m still here. Yes, the polka dots are still on my wall. And yes, I’m still working on creating content that I hope is helpful and inspiring. Lately I’ve just found myself a bit overwhelmed by all that I’m building, by my several page to-do list, and all of the things I juggle on a daily basis. Can anyone else relate? 

One thing that’s been helpful for me in this process has been to redefine my terms of success. As we are always in the process of growing and expanding, we are always going to be chasing new desires. We are always going to be working towards something, looking out to the future. And yet, too much goal chasing can prevent us from taking in all the goodness that is here right now. This moment now, the one we’ll never have in the exact same way again. 

Perhaps then, the best measure of success on any given day is not how many boxes we frantically checked off on our to-do lists, how much we hustled, or how many forced actions we took towards our goals, but instead on how many moments we were fully PRESENT. How much we took in with our senses. How much we fully appreciated being alive. And so my new measure of success is in moments of presence, appreciation, flow, and love given and received. Because isn't that what we really want anyway? 

Yeah, there are aspects of my work that I love and aspects that I don't. There are parts of building my business that I enjoy and parts that I don't. There are things I have to do, even if I don't always want to do them. And yet, when I am in that appreciative state of being – when I am present and here now – I actually can get done what needs to get done more efficiently. From a centered and good-feeling space, I can take inspired actions that feel energizing and exciting, as opposed to those that I fearfully force against the flow.