INTRODUCTION
There are some of life’s questions which we need to ask ourselves once in a while. These questions would help us live our lives in the direction we want them to go, they will help us see our lives in clearer views, devoid of the aesthetics we tend to surround them with. They will help define us, so people know who we are, what we offer, and what we accept.
I am talking about questions which lead us to discovering our rules of life.
Image by Brian Kostiuk on Unsplash
I once read a story about a man who wanted a shoemaker to make him a pair of shoes. So he goes to the shoemaker and asks him to make him a pair.
“What kind of design do you want?” the shoemaker asks, “The parabolic or the squared tip?”
“Anyone will be fine,” replies the man and on his way he went.
The shoemaker nodded.
Days passed and the man finally went to get his new shoes. He was excited until he saw them. The shoemaker had made a different design for each leg. One had parabolic tip and the other had a square tip. The man could not complain as he knew he gave no choice to the shoemaker, and so he went about with different kinds of shoes.
THE RULES FOR YOUR LIFE
I don’t know how true the above story is, but I know for sure that if you don’t make decisions about your life, others will make a decision for you, and you will find out that you are not living your life, but that of others.
There are few things as annoying as an indecisive person, but more annoying is a person who has no inkling about what he or she wants in life. Such person has no direction and has no need for loyalty to a cause. This can be a problem as, years later, when all is said and done, the person may realize that he or she had not lived at all, but had just moved through life in any and all directions.
The best way to have a mind of your own is to have your own rules of life, your own convictions, your own expectations, and your own mindset. You should have things that are unacceptable, and things you embrace, things you live by, things you love, things you abhor; things that will define you. Not having these things mean that you stand for nothing, and if you stand for nothing then you will fall for anything, and a life of purpose has a goal in mind and so is very deliberate about what it falls for and what it allows as distractions.
Now these rules should have some characteristics...
- They should pertain to you and you alone. Don’t go looking for other people’s rules and then borrow them, except you really want to make them yours. We are talking about your life here, and not that of the next person.
- They should represent you. When someone sees these rules, they should be reminded of you. Having a rule you don’t live by is hypocrisy, first to yourself and then to the world.
- They don’t have to be written on stone. The truth is that we are fallible humans, and so we learn each day as we get older. If along the line you realize that one of your rules is wrong or doesn’t define you or is no longer acceptable, please do change it as it is not written in stone.
- You don’t have to get them all in one day. As I said earlier, we are humans and so we learn as we get older. We don’t have to know it all today, as we will learn more tomorrow. So, write your rules as you journey through life, and live by the ones you have made yours.
No great person ever lived without a rule governing his or her life. Having rules for your life may not make things easier, but they sure will make them simple and life could do with some simplicity with all the complications we get served with per second. Think up any truly great person you know, read about them or observe them, you’d see consistencies in their lives, you’d see self imposed boundaries they live within, you’d see what they stand for, you’d see principles, you’d see sacrifices made, you’d see that they don’t just let things go as they want to. While they are aware that not everything can be influenced, they take charge of those which can be and live deliberately.
Image by Mark Duffel on Unsplash
MY POINT
So ask yourself what you live by, what defines your day to day existence, what makes you say yes or no to requests, what makes you wake up instead of sleeping in, what makes you you? Ask yourself these questions daily, weekly, or monthly, give yourself true and quick answers. Write them down. That’s how you know your rules of life, that’s how you know what directs you. You can edit them if you want, or you can leave them as they are, but by all means have your rules of life, know them, and live by them.
Live. Deliberately.
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