Tag: fulfilment

  • Be blessed, not entitled

    Be blessed, not entitled

    Appreciation is simply an acknowledgement of what we feel blessed with, while gratitude is reflected in what we claim to appreciate.

    The secret to contentment is found in gratitude.

    But not in an attitude of gratitude.

    It must be more substantial than that.

    Gratitude must be a meaningful connection with what we truly value about ourselves and our lives, and not just appreciation for having more than others.

    Gratitude allows us to focus on what’s good, and realise how much worse things could be.

    It encourages appreciation for what we have instead of envy for what we don’t have.

    Most importantly, it recognises the blessings that most take for granted like good health, free time, youthfulness, good relations, and peace of mind.

    When we lose gratitude for these things, we take it for granted and stop doing what is needed to maintain it.

    That’s when we lose it.

    And if we still don’t recognise our ingratitude at that point, our difficulties become a trial rather than a reminder leading us to believe that we’re cursed or being tested by divine decree.

    Live with gratitude. Always.

  • Gratitude, the root of peace

    Gratitude, the root of peace

    As long as you have gratitude in your heart, you will always find opportunities instead of problems in your life.

    Gratitude allows us to focus on what’s good, and realise how much worse things could be.

    It encourages appreciation for what we have instead of envy for what we don’t have.

    Most importantly, it recognises the blessings that most take for granted like good health, free time, youthfulness, good relations, and peace of mind.

    When we lose gratitude for these things, we take it for granted and stop doing what is needed to maintain it.

    That’s when we lose it.

    And if we still don’t recognise our ingratitude at that point, our difficulties become a trial rather than a reminder.

    Live with gratitude. Always.

  • Soul food

    Soul food

    The physical form demands fulfilment, while the soul demands peace.

    Too often, we mistake the fulfilment of our physical needs to be soul food, and we neglect our soul.

    As this soul food grows familiar, we seek ever more creative ways to get that fulfilment leading us further into indulgence, and away from peace.

    Soul food is the feeling you get from an embrace with a loved one before you notice the scent of their perfume.

    It’s the sound of the dove cooing before you admire your beautiful bird bath.

    It’s the laughter of family before you notice the luxury with which you clothe them.

    Pause.

    Take a deep breath.

    Look a little closer.

    Beyond the physical.

    Look at what money can’t buy, or hands can’t manipulate, and you’ll find the divine, sublimely tucked away with the peace that you’ve been searching for, for so long…

    And remember, what feeds your soul rarely fills your belly.

    So don’t be reckless with where you seek fulfilment in your life, because you may just discover that after exhausting yourself in that pursuit for decades, you were only distracting yourself with trinkets that have no soul.

  • It starts and ends with gratitude

    It starts and ends with gratitude

    Many struggle with achieving a sense of fulfilment in their lives because they have yet to appreciate, with sincerity, the value that they hold within themselves.

    We only make ourselves truly available in a relationship, romantic or otherwise, if we believe that who we are will be valued by others.

    The irony is that gratitude for who we are is needed before we see fit to share anything of ourselves with others, while sharing the same is the first step towards experiencing the gratitude of fulfilment.

    Such conundrums are common in our efforts to live a life of purpose.

    Purpose is not found in the acquisition of valuables for ourselves, but rather in the creation of value for others.

    I think in there lies the secret to experiencing any sense of peace in this lifetime.

    When we protect ourselves from the possibility of rejection, we deny ourselves the very fulfilment we need to feel complete, and therefore create opportunities for bitterness or regret to take hold in our lives.

    It all starts with gratitude, and fulfilment is sealed with gratitude.

    Be grateful for how your journey shaped you into who you are, so that you stop holding others accountable for your happiness.

    [This was a difficult thought process to articulate. Hope it makes sense.]

  • Pursuit of servitude

    Pursuit of servitude

    I once asked myself a simple question when I left corporate to follow a new path. What do you do when you’re done with the world, but the world is not done with you? The two and a bit years that followed answered this question many times over, each time with an intensity greater than the last.

    The answer appears to be very different from what I was expecting. Initially, I assumed that perhaps the world I thought I was done with was not my world at all. And so I set out to create the world, my world, that I thought was truer to my purpose in life.

    Yet, here I am, contemplating again if this is really the world that I wanted to create for myself. When faced with the evidence of the sum total of my efforts, there are two ways in which I could respond. I could be generous and assume that I am still learning and therefore falling short of my goals is an inevitable part of that journey. Or, I could be brutally honest and recognise that perhaps my assumption of being able to claim a world for myself was born in arrogance.

    The question that therefore needs to answered is not what to do with the world that may be done with me, but rather, what will it take to recognise my place in this world that is larger than I’ll ever be?

    To know my place has always been the greatest mystery. There’s a combination of understanding who I am and what purpose I serve to others that continues to escape me. On both counts. My understanding of myself remains a well kept secret, and as for my purpose, I’ve always pursued roles of servitude. Therefore, any consideration beyond that continues to be a mystery.

    My world must therefore be defined by that which demands my contribution. The moment I claim a recompense, I outstay my welcome and violate my purpose. The end result will therefore be inevitably unpleasant. Perhaps the question that I’ve been asking is the wrong question.

    But, the answer lies in asking the right question. And if peace is associated with that answer, then it stands to reason that peace, along with my understanding of my place in that world, will continue to be an answer whose question I have yet to grasp.

    Cryptic thoughts for a cryptic life. And peace has no part in it.

  • Wisdom with purpose

    Wisdom with purpose

    Acquiring knowledge without implementing it is like hoping to quench your thirst while standing in the rain.

    Seeking to understand is great, but only if we apply that understanding in the way we treat others.

    Similarly, acquiring technical knowledge may feed our fascination, but fulfilment lies in using that knowledge to create something of substance that offers value to others.

    I think it was Al Ghazzali that said, “Why accumulate more knowledge if you don’t practice on the knowledge that you have?”

  • A Long Overdue Brain Dump

    A Long Overdue Brain Dump

    Certainty is such a mirage. Predictability convinces me that I have stability, but when the disruption comes, I realise that I was simply taking comfort from probabilities. But that’s what life is about, isn’t it? The probability of everything. The probability of good fortune keeps us chasing and the probability of death stops us in our tracks. The present moment is invested in whatever we believe those probabilities to be.

    Sometimes life is so curiously challenging that death looks like a welcome break from the norm. The consistency of struggles and the ease that follows. After each cycle, the struggle that follows the ease is what I preempt, and I lose sight of the ease when I have it. That’s how my tolerance and my tenacity wears down. What doesn’t kill you certainly makes you more brittle. I often feel the brittleness creeping in.

    Clarity of thought has been elusive. Moments of inspiration and conviction form and then flee and then form and then flee. Is this what menopause must feel like for a woman? The tease of comfort followed by the taunt of its ugly sister?

    I need to revisit my timeline from before seven years ago. That was the last time I wrote anything that continues to resonate with me now. There were a few isolated thoughts that I scribed in between, but nothing worth revisiting in the awkward silence before bedtime. The silence that flirts with the failures of the day and caresses the hopes of tomorrow.

    There was a time when I thought in prose. The vivid nature of the imagery my words conjured in my mind before leaving my body used to offer me some respite from the madness of me. Now it simply echoes it. My echo chamber is empty. It doesn’t even taunt me with my own whispers any more.

    I’m always on the brink of something amazing. Then I watch an enthralling movie and contemplate the genius of the mind behind the story while questioning the value of my ramblings in its shadow. I need to abandon the legend in my mind before my story will find its own path. I pause at intersections for too long these days. I used to choose a path the moment those intersections came into view, yet now that contemplation continues for much longer after my arrival at that point. Something is amiss and I suspect the answer lies in what is amiss. How do you find an answer that is hidden in the question?

    Late night ramblings or early morning hopes carry the same burden of promise and anticipation. Its fulfilment lies in the fading tenacity and resilience of the rambler and thus appear like an iridescent mirage flirting with the horizon but never reaching out. Opportunity rarely reaches out. It most often sits in the shadows waiting expectantly while not revealing any clues of its willingness to be courted or wedded. It’s an obstinate grunt that shuns the smiles of my hope while grabbing my ankles as soon as I turn to walk away towards the next intersection.

    This grid of madness grows more uncomfortable each day. Am I the village idiot? The one who has a place and a purpose, but never a captive audience, only a fleeting joy passed on to others while my own cup remains unfilled. Or is that the ingratitude that stifles my progress? The pretense of generosity of spirit that cloaks the need for celebration. I’m not alone in such pretences. I see you, clearer than you see me. But I see me reflected in you and I find it distasteful, that my recognition of your weakness is a reminder that I must know such weakness first to recognise it in you.

    This city of solitude is quiet in all the wrong spaces, and rowdy where it matters least.

  • Swimming Upstream

    It’s the counter-intuitiveness of that statement that resonates with my experiences in life, in general. Similar to the salmon, it seems to be driven by the belief that at the top of that stream lies fulfilment and purpose. But pushing against the tide is tiresome.

    Purpose doesn’t always bring fulfilment. It’s a stark reality that dawned on me today when I considered the potential outcome of my life if I continue to be driven by the principles and values that I subscribe to now. It is generally accepted that those that change the world are rarely part of the crowd because it stands to reason that to be able to determine what the cause of the chaos in the crowd is, one would have to extract themselves from those surrounds in order to obtain a clearer view. But people don’t like it when you have a clear view of their shortcomings or their fears. It makes them vulnerable, and in the absence of trust, that vulnerability becomes something that either needs to be disguised cleverly, or defended fiercely.

    I usually find myself on the receiving end of the latter, and it is this realisation that has caused me to contemplate whether or not I will achieve a sense of fulfilment before the end of my time. I’m convinced that I won’t. Explaining or rationalising this is proving difficult.

    I see myself on the outside looking in surrounded by people that are more intent on maintaining the peace than dealing with the rot, but simultaneously lamenting the gravity of life in those moments when the stench of that rot permeates their idyllic make-believe world. Rather than deal with the rot, we invest in disguises to convince us that it’s either not so bad, or that it doesn’t even exist. I’m the fool that comes along, scoops up a handful of that decaying matter, and brandishes it about in people’s faces until they acknowledge that their disguises are bullshit and that their supposed progress is in fact a lie.

    People tend to despise the one that disrupts their slumber but instead embraces the one that sings them the lullaby. It’s ironic then that the success that they later achieve as a result of being stirred from their stupor is celebrated with the one that made their sleep as peaceful as possible, instead of appreciating the one that unsettled their existence. Those that disrupt force us to break the inane cycles that trap us into the ruts of our lives. Unfortunately too many are comfortable despising the rut while defending it fiercely, believing that they’re protecting themselves while flirting with dreams that only they know exists.

    Dreams of greatness, of purpose, and of celebration. They dream of being celebrated for amazing contributions, but they rarely if ever share that dream with others because of the fear of ridicule or failure. They’re the ones that swim in the calm waters away from the rapids. They’re the ones that are convinced that maintaining the order and revering the system is what is best for society, while forgetting that the system that they revere was in fact established by those they despise.

    Swimming upstream is an exercise in futility laced with a hint of greatness, but it’s that greatness that drives those that are born restless. Those that spurn complacency and mediocrity. It’s not the greatness associated with recognition or affirmation, because that is merely slavery embellished with hollow accolades. It is the greatness that is felt with the knowledge that there are lives that have been nudged at just the right time to get a timid soul to change course from one that was entrenched in pain and servitude, to one that offered fulfilment and mastery.