Once not long ago I had a conversation with a gentleman who was cusping that midlife period and there was so much about his mindset that found inspiring and wanted to learn from. He was so happy, resilient, and remained so positive in the midst of life’s pitfalls and challenges. I could tell immediately there was so much I could learn from him.
Since then we have had multiple conversations about life, what determines that experience of fulfillment for men, and what is the interior life like for a midlife family man, discussing the positives and the negatives. I was asking him questions in hopes of getting some insight into what ingredients he possessed that made him the person he was.
He responded to me with a story. Many years ago he discovered it was paramount that he feels driven on a daily basis, and in order for him to feel driven he had to be doing something that he loved. He emphasized that one doesn’t necessarily have to love what they are doing one hundred percent of the time, but one must lose track of time, one must experience their day racing by until suddenly it’s evening time. Once you realize that this particular thing you are doing speeds up time, then one must figure out how to do more of it. One thing this gentleman told me was that he was deathly afraid of monotony and stagnation, not moving toward a goal or attaining anything major in his life by way of challenging himself.
He then recommended that one figure out a way to do more of this thing that makes time fly. Because for him to live out his life barely feeling alive was the worst thing in the entire world. I ask you to find that one thing or those few things that make you feel alive and bring you so much joy that time begins to fly.
The more you live your life in this headspace, this mindset that doing this thing brings to you, the more you will reverse that experience of possible disillusionment with life, possible monotony. If these are experiences that you are currently having on a regular basis, I challenge you to sit down with a pen and paper and go back over your years to find that one thing that made time fly for you.
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This post has been republished on Medium.
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