Goals

Soooooooo, last night I started reading Barbara Sher's book Wishcraft  which has become a standard in the field of career counselling.  Even the guy who wrote What Colour is Your Parachute had good things to say about it.  I'm only on the first chapter but I'm going to take my time and make sure I do it thoroughly and with lots of thought.  We both need to re-evaluate everything and find a way to change our lives for the better.  We already have made great strides by moving to the island in the first place, we have already succeeded in having the lifestyle we want, now to streamline it so that we can sustain it with work we love and make enough to live well.  Neither of us is really very materialistic, we cook a lot at home, we enjoy the simple things, the quiet life. 
Anyway the first part of the book has two exercises, 1. Who do you think you are?  and 2. Remember your original self.  She asks the reader to write down who you are, then crumple up the paper and throw it out, then write down your memories of what you loved to see, hear, do as a child growing up, no editing, just remembering.  This exercise helps to dissolve the limiting box of thoughts about how we should be and opens us up to possibility.  How many of us have completely forgotten about our hope and dreams of our youth?  How many of us completely negate the hobbies, interests, talents that we have but don't think of them as important in the grand scheme of things.  We tend to limit ourselves to what actions have moved us forward in a career.
I've always loved those stories of people who have a talent that they end up pursuing later in life and finding that it brings them a prosperity they never dreamed of.  The book Under the Tuscan Sun is one of them, not the movie, the book.  The book was written by a university literature professor ( Frances Mayes) who, in mid-life, was unexpectedly divorced.   She went to Italy and bought a run-down villa, wrote about it and created a best selling book, a movie was made about it and it brought her a life that was never imagined in her wildest dreams.  Another story I saw on the wonderful tv show called Recreating Eden about a man called Barrie Strohman who retired from his job as a contractor and began cultivating lilies on his property.  He became one of the most well-know lily experts in the world! 
There are so many stories like this, they are so inspirational.  I do not expect to become famous or rich but only to enjoy life and have a right livelihood which is: as Zen teacher Thich Nhat Hanh wrote,"To practice Right Livelihood (samyag ajiva), you have to find a way to earn your living without transgressing your ideals of love and compassion. The way you support yourself can be an expression of your deepest self, or it can be a source of suffering for you and others. "
So I will journal my progress as well as other day to day events.
Today we planned to go to Victoria shopping but it was too windy so we decided not to take the chance of ferry cancellations and postponed until tomorrow maybe.


Hope