It takes instruments.
And it takes musicians to play those instruments.
Don’t fret about the stage.
It finds the music makers.
Here is this idea from three years ago…
Acknowledging fear.
Respecting freedom.
Learning from failure.
Or maybe the truly tough choice is in choosing the light in which you see these realities that are part of all that we experience.
We’re typically in the dark when we consider the fear, freedom, and failure we experience in our days.
Strike a match and burn three candles: acknowledgement, respect, and education.
Who doesn’t love a great story?
In 2010, I read Donald Miller’s A Million Miles in a Thousand Years and was forever changed.
Finding the concept of story and living a life with meaning and purpose (like a story) was enough to take my life, relationships, and businesses to a whole new level. My wife and I even named our first child Story.
Moving on…
Grand stories are made up of small, easily over-looked stories. The call, the note, the joke, the stranger, the friend, the enemy, the meal, the travel, the action, the reaction, the response, and repetition of it all can be forgettable. The beat of life, relationships, and businesses goes and then and then and then and then…
And then there was today and then there will be tomorrow.
To create a life and a career that are out of the ordinary, we must continually create unforgettable moments and stories that normally would be missed or overlooked.
January 1st you’re asking ‘now what?’.
December 31st you’ll be asking ‘so what?’.
Success without fulfillment is failure. Anthony Robbins
Think about it.
Resolutions.
These things we long to do in the next 365 days. Goals, dreams, and a myriad of won’t-dos and to-dos that are as unique as each one is an individual.
And these are good. We set them. We reach them. We progress.
However, they aren’t us and they aren’t you. As hard as we try to hang a hat on them, the hat just won’t hang (or not like we thought it would).
We aren’t trophies, spreadsheets, calories, or accolades.
We are hearts with hands, feet, eyes, tongues, and ideas.
The great David Crowder gave us a beautiful word picture of the heart, its nest, and the force that powers it. He wrote, “What was said to the rose to make it unfold was said to me here in my chest.” To this day, those words take my breath away.
So rather than give 2015 a number, a net worth, or a behavior modification, what if we gave this year the chance to nourish and bloom that thing in our chest?
When something blooms it has arrived at its most beautiful moment. All the soil tilling and stem growth has led to that moment. In that moment a fragrance is offered, its form marveled, and just the simplicity of this bloom on display can change the vibe and feel of a room.
Perhaps when we are in bloom there’s a fragrant offering to the world, beauty released, and a vibe that changes people, moments, and the universe itself?
The heart…guard it. It’s been called the wellspring of life. We must also garden it so it will be given the opportunity bloom and re-bloom again and again.
Happy New Year.
Let the music play and let the flower bloom.
Ashton.Gustafson 