Tuesday, February 17, 2009

Reinvent yourself the world

So, you've lost your house to forclosure and you're collecting unemployment and you think that is a bad thing. However, it just might be the best thing that ever happened to you in disguise.

In 1994 I thought I could not survive a divorce that included 4 children ages 5 to 20 with my age 45. However, I did. Do you know how?

I took to heart the phrase, "There are no problems only opportunities." If you only look at these times as insurmountable problems they will drive you insane or kill you. However, if you say, like Americans have since the 1600's, "There are opportunities here. Let's find out what they are and make the most of them." After all you only need one good idea to have a good life. Though it took me about one year, my "There are no problems only opportunities" attitude took me to one good decision that took me from Bankruptcy and divorce to a new marriage, new ways forward and to a renewal of hope. However, the beginning was deciding in my heart of hearts that there now were only opportunities and tuning my mind to that.

Likewise now, if you have lost your house or your job or both, to survive well, you must let go of your upsetedness long enough to embrace ALL the opportunities available to you and your family.

This doesn't mean it will be easy. On the contrary you might be in a life or death, or even starvation and homelessness kind of place in your life. But I guarantee you that seeing only opportunities will save your life and the lives of those around you.

Once you get resituated in a new home, converted Garage of a friend, or new area in which there are jobs, reassess your life situation. If you are burned out looking for work in your field and there are thousands of people competing for the same job, obviously you have to rethink your situation. If thousands of people are applying for the job you want then you only have 1 chance in that many thousands of getting it. Let's create better odds for you. How can you do that?

We start by reinventing ourselves, seeing there are only opportunites because the flipside of EVERY problem is an opportunity staring you in the face. Let me give you an example:

You lose your home: opportunity: I can live anywhere I want to on earth!
You lose your job: opportunity: I can work anywhere and do any job I'm trained for or can train for.

You lose your spouse: I can stay single or I can live with someone and I can move and do anything I want to!

You lose your business: opportunity: I can go bankrupt with a chapter 13 and keep my car and home or if things are really bad I can get a Chapter 7 and move to another place and start completely over, alone or with my family. What a great opportunity!

To all the above: I can do anything I want to and live any life I choose including the one I've always dreamed of!

Reinvent yourself. Reinvent you life. Life doesn't have to suck! Make your life fun! Make it what you always dreamed of but couldn't because you were busy pleasing everyone else and never yourself. Live big! Live life! Live your dreams! Now is your time!

Personal experiences:

Though this might not make sense to you in this context please bear with me:

In 1960 I was 12 years old. I had just started Junior High School (grades 7 through 9) at Woodrow Wilson Junior High School in Glendale, California. I rode my racing bicycle several miles to school. One day I noticed that some kid had separated an all metal roller skate and had nailed the front and back wheel sections to a about a foot long 2 by 4 (stud). He was pushing this thing with his foot. This later became known as a skateboard. Kids in my area likely invented this thing because it reminded them of surfing which was all the Craze in Los Angeles County at that time. The Beach Boys were just beginning those years to popularize surfing. Later that year I noticed that friends of mine were getting large pieces of wood and taking them into wood shop to make skateboards that looked like little wooden surfboards.

About the same place I saw the 2 by 4 on a separated metal skate I saw a girl in jeans with a pendleton wool shirt on. It was unthinkable that a girl would dress this way then in public. Then, because it was hot, this girl took off her pendleton and had a sleeveless shirt on with underarm hair. This was unthinkable then. I had seen my first (UC Berkeley) girl and I was shocked. It was the time of the free speech movement to allow swearing in Universities and of Mario Savio and all the movements that sprung from all that like women's liberation and everyone's liberation and all that.

In these two ways the world as I grew up completely reinvented itself from the ground up. Everything changed, and women's liberation as well as everyone's liberation as well as surfboards and skateboards and all these things now permeate world culture.

The point is any good idea you have might change the world in a good way. It's time for us all to start changing the world to what we want it to be once again. Have hope. Just try! One good idea of yours might save the world from extinction. Try it!

1 comment:

Juile said...

Easier said than done but the route to growing as a person and in your business is certainly to reinvent yourself.
Millioniare Maker