Hindsight is 20/20... or so they say. But that's the rub. While we are living our day to day lives, we are only living little nuggets of the big picture. That's when it's tough. That's when we don't know if we've lost our minds by choosing the lives we choose. And make no mistake, our lives are shaped entirely by our choices, because even when things happen to us that are out of our control, we still choose how we interpret those events and more importantly how we will react to them.
I think everyone wants to live an extraordinary life, but I don't know that everyone wants to do what it takes to get that life. You have to live with integrity and make decisions that align with your values and goals, even if that means giving up things you really want in the moment.
I love asking people if they have any regrets in life. What I find, more times than not, is that the things that people regret are usually things that didn't reconcile with their inner voice. They married the guy, when they knew something wasn't right. They took the job with the hefty paycheck when their heart was with the startup. They didn't tell someone they loved them until it was too late.
I believe that God is always guiding us. We do have free will to make our own decisions, but He can always work with the path we choose. We need to be listening though, which means we can't set up shop in "me mode" and do what we feel like all of time. Like any other skill, the more we listen to our intuition, the sharper it gets. Our inner voices are meant to help us live with integrity. When we live in alignment with who we are, not who anyone else expects us to be, we clear the highway for God to work through us in amazing ways.
But the truth is, more times than not, I don't understand. I know so much of life is living in the mystery. I know I wouldn't want to know the how and why and when even if I could. Knowing would be like sweeping up all of the magic and pixie dust that gives life its sparkle. Instead of going on a grand adventure, our lives would be a process of ticking boxes.
Believing is hard though. Sometimes staying the course feels like such a waste, no matter how much you try to appreciate the blessings you have in your life right now. I suppose that's the beauty of the human experience. We are born reaching for more. We are all united in that. Everyone walking this Earth has something in their heart that they long for, whether they are willing to say it out loud or not. The wonder comes from knowing everything can change on a dime. You can change on a dime. Being alive is being in constant motion. My god daughter reminded me of that last night when she told me in her cutest matter of fact voice that even when you are playing the freeze game, your blood is still moving.
Nobody said extraordinary was easy, but we achieve it one tiny bit at a time... one step, one thought, one decision. The truth is extraordinary is available to us at any given moment. We just have to recognize it, then reach out and grab it.