Ever think about the “What if’s?” ,“Could of’s?”, “Should of’s”, “If only” and “if I did it this way”, that it would have changed the outcome? I had a thought the other day that made me think about the amount of time we spend thinking about if we chose differently how it would have cultivated a different outcome.
Thoughts like “If I did this differently, I would not have missed out?”
You may keep thinking about a situation in your mind about the way you handled something that made you miss out on an opportunity. I certainly am not here to try to tell you what to think or feel, but what I would like you to consider is a different perspective? What do you know now that you didn’t know then?, “How has this experience changed you? Are you focusing on the lesson this situation provided you with? Or do you keep replaying the thing that didn’t go your way like a constant rerun of the same movie?
I believe that by constantly focusing on “what didn’t go you your way” you keep focusing in the past and keep thinking about what you still do not have, this to me is lack mentality, you do not appreciate what didn’t go your way as a lesson to make you realise what you need to learn to achieve what it is that what you want… no one was ever born and started walking on the day they came out of the womb, it’s the old saying “you need to walk before you crawl!” .
The other issue with focusing on “what didn’t go your way” is that your mind is stuck in the past, you expend energy and thought by thinking about the “regret” in the situation rather than the “experience”, by focusing on the experience you move forward into the present moment and continue to work towards what you want and attaining it, rather than sitting and thinking about what you still don’t have.
Another example of this is when someone exits your life with no explanation and you have thoughts like “What did I do wrong?”, “Why did they not give me an explanation?”, These thoughts are valid and it would be ideal if the person in question had the courtesy to provide you with the answers you so desperately keep thinking about, the fact and reality is there are many situations in life where we are not provided with an explanation or “feedback” , instead of expending energy on why they didn’t provide you with an explanation – focus on the reality that the closure is in the form of their absence, if someone wanted to provide you with an explanation they would and they would find you to do so, instead of focusing on “why didn’t they explain?” think about “Why bother investing thought into someone who does not bother with me?” and move forward….Shut the door on this, don’t get stuck in the doorway!.
There is a quote by Anthony Bourdain that I love which highlights the point I am trying to make quite well “Travel isn’t always comfortable, the journey changes you, It should change you.” ….Where will you focus your energy?
