Anonymous Quote

The other day I came across this quote - "At the age of twenty, we don't care what the world thinks of us; at thirty, we worry about what it is thinking of us; at forty, we discover that it wasn't thinking of us at all."

In my humble opinion I think that this is a big bucket of cow poop. Firstly, I strongly dislike generalisations (unless I am making them) and secondly, well, I just don't like it. This person obviously wanted to remain anonymous because either they knew that they were talking absolute nonsense or they just wanted to create a reaction in someone like me.....well done Mr. Anonymous, you have succeeded!

Here is my amended quote - "At twenty, I knew the world was thinking of me; at thirty, I will still know that the world is thinking of me; at forty, I will definitely know that the world is still thinking of me." I cannot presume to know what YOU think of what the world thinks of you, all I can do is convey what I think and what I think, and what I have known for quite sometime, is that the world, the universe, is always on MY side IF I am on its side too.

By "universe" I mean everything that is in my world (people, plants, animals, myself) therefore, in order for the universe to hear me, I need to hear the needs of the universe too. I cannot expect love and happiness if I live my life treating others (or myself) with indifference and sadness. What I get from the world entirely depends on what the world gets from me.

One of my favourite Paulo Coelho quotes is, "When you want something, the whole Universe conspires to help you realise your desire." There is no better way of saying that and it is because of this quote and because of the life I have lived that I know that world is, and always will be, thinking of me.

Take a breath...

We all have something that we are aspiring to, whether it is a job or a romantic connection or losing weight, we all have things in our lives that we want to achieve. So, as a result we are looking forward all the time. We are looking to see how long we still have to go, we are looking forward to all the appointments we are going to, we are looking at what still needs to be done. Very rarely do we realise that last week today was the future and last week we knew we were going to accomplish something by today. So, I urge you to STOP and take a BREATH and look at what you have accomplished already.

9 months ago I was no longer a teacher but I was at the beginning of my journey to becoming a freelance writer. About two months ago I stopped and took a breath and realised that I was writing and earning money and I was, in fact, living my dream.

What an amazing feeling that was and I would not have felt that if I had not stopped for a moment and looked, not into the future, but into my present. I used to day dream a lot about how I imagined my life but now I go to bed and I dream about my reality and when I wake up I live that reality and my dreams are merely little voices in my head that gently call to me every now and again. I don't live in that dream any more, that dream lives in me.

Yes, I still have many things that I want to achieve but I cannot achieve them if I am not being active in my reality. I believe that only three things can make you lose your way - firstly, if you only ever look to the future and the present becomes your dream, secondly, if you only complain about your present and your future is nothing but a dream that helps you sleep at night and lastly, in the words of Paulo Coelho, "Only one thing makes a dream impossible: the fear of failure."

Dreams (aspirations) should just act as goals, they are not to be lived in. Your reality can only be a success if your dreams live in you and you live in the present.