I graduated from High School a little over 25 years ago. I remember being filled with hope and wonder. I hoped for a beautiful future and wondered what it would be like to be an adult. I knew it was time to be responsible for myself. I felt myself moving into the real world and hoped that I would not be faced with a rude awakening.
My dream was to become a High School Teacher. Even at that age, I knew I enjoyed teaching others and I thought it would be a great way to spend a life.
When I would see people I knew, they would congratulate me and ask me what I was going to do. When I told them that I planned on becoming a teacher, most of them said, "there is not a lot of money in that." The more I heard that comment, the more I began to change my mind about the career I would pursue.
The Real World
The real world taught me that money is important. It became very clear to me that I needed to engage in a career that could support the kind of lifestyle that I wanted. I wanted to get married and raise a family, and I knew that it would take a lot of money to provide for my wants and needs.
My career planning exercises began to focus on what I could do to make a lot of money. I no longer thought about who I wanted to be when I grew up or about what would fulfill me. I just thought about how I could make the most money.
I finally settle on working for my uncle. He was one of the most successful people I knew. I had no idea at all about the business he was in, I just knew that he made a lot of money. I believed that if I went to work with him, I would make a lot of money too. This thinking proved to be true and I found myself making a wonderful living at a very young age. I still dreamed of being a teacher some day, but the longer I worked, the more I believed that it if I made that switch, I would never be able to make the kind of living I needed to make to provide for my family.
Parallel Lives
At a early sales job I met a lifelong friend. Blair had the same sort of hopes and aspirations that I had. We talked during our breaks about becoming lawyers or doctors. The whole world was ahead of us and we knew we could conquer it together. We met when we were single and formed a fast and steady friendship. Since that time, our lives have run a similar course. We were married within 10 days of each other and we each find ourselves raising seven kids with the beautiful and intelligent wife of our youth. We celebrated our 20 year anniversaries together in Hawaii last year.
Shortly after Blair married Katy, he decided that he was not going to go to law school or medical school. Instead, he declared that he was going to become a teacher. This surprised us all, but he was serious about it and he began to dedicate his life to that purpose. My initial thought was the thought that I had been programmed to think. I believed that he would never be able to support a family on a teacher’s salary.
As the years passed, I noticed something very interesting. Blair and Katy seemed to be doing just fine. We visited them often and noticed very little differences between our two lives. They were raising just as many children and living in a similar size home, They were adequately feeding and clothing their children and enjoying life. Their life was different than ours, but those differences generally seemed to be irrelevant. We could see that they were happy and that life was just as good for them as it was for us. Each of us were making different sacrifices to enjoy the life.
I was enjoying my life, but I was not engaged in the work that I wanted to be doing. I knew that there was something more for me to do, but I felt trapped by the successes that I was having in my previous line of work. The unexpected death of my father caused me to re-evaluate my life. He died too young. I knew that the same could happen to me. I decided to start living my life on purpose and in a way that would help me become the person I always wanted to me. For me, this meant a career change, but it doesn’t always have to be that way. For you, it just might mean refocusing and realigning your current work habits with the lifestyle that you know you need.
Life Is Short
The older I get, the more I realize that time is the only scarce resource we possess. I meet very few people like Blair who were willing to sacrifice the pursuit of riches for the pursuit of quality. Most of the people I work with find themselves burdened by the their constant journey toward wealth. It is clear that they have spent too much time creating material value and not enough time creating their life.
This is easy for me to understand because living in poverty does not necessarily create a happy life either. Our financial successes actually make it possible for us to enjoy life more. The problem is that very few of us know how to define "enough" and even fewer know what to do when we get there. Many of us spend our lives working to get a bigger home or a better boat, instead of just enjoying the one we have.
I work with many people who enjoy tremendous success. Each one of them describes a very similar experience. They tell me that along the way to creating financial security they found themselves asking a very important question; "Is this all there is? Is life just a series of buying the next best thing?" They say that after a certain point, the material things that they were able to purchase could no longer fulfill them. We are working together now, so that they can discover what brings meaning to their lives. They know it is not material things. Our time together is focused on the transition from net worth to individual worth.
What Is Your Purpose?
The financial achievements we enjoy are very important. They help create the foundation for a life filled with quality. But they do not represent the only variables of the equation for a happy life. They are only part of that equation. Sooner or later, we all realize that there is something more. It is never too late to do something about that. We can redefine or realign our lives at any age. That’s what makes life so great is that it is always full of so many wonderful opportunities. When we know what we want, those opportunities move into our zone of focus.
As we age, it becomes increasingly more critical for us to learn what we must do to feel whole and complete. I manage this need by constantly asking myself the question, "Who do I want to be when I grow whole?" The many answers to this question help me understand what I must do now, so that I may become the person I aspire to become. I never grow tired of asking myself this question, because it always leads me to new answers.
Today, I invite you today to take some time and think about your life. What is life like for you? Are you getting the most out of it? If not, what do you think must happen for that to change? What can you do today that will help get the most out of your life? Think about it, and then get moving.
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