When I was a lot younger, someone told me that they were accused of living vicariously through me. After I went to look up the word, I felt like that was the best compliment I could ever get. I also realized that I had never done that because I had always had plans which were much bigger than me and those plans dominated my daydreams.
In my experience, people often forget what they are trying to accomplish so they look around for something to accomplish. Many never see it. I believe I am a lateral thinker (rather than linear), which can carry with it problems of lack of focus. The focus gets better with each passing year, but then, there was always one general direction in which I was looking anyway.
I had overheard the term 'room with a view' when I was growing up; it was in songs and stories and on the tips of people's tongues. I wondered what the big deal was with a view. Maybe it had something to do with that other overused term 'big picture'. I haven't heard that one enough!
Big Picture? Look Closer!
An old friend of mine once told me I was lucky. He obviously didn't feel my personal struggles. He spent a lot of time wishing that he had had a different life with more opportunities. I told him to look out the window to see what opportunities he had been missing.In my experience, people often forget what they are trying to accomplish so they look around for something to accomplish. Many never see it. I believe I am a lateral thinker (rather than linear), which can carry with it problems of lack of focus. The focus gets better with each passing year, but then, there was always one general direction in which I was looking anyway.
I had overheard the term 'room with a view' when I was growing up; it was in songs and stories and on the tips of people's tongues. I wondered what the big deal was with a view. Maybe it had something to do with that other overused term 'big picture'. I haven't heard that one enough!
Big Picture? Look Closer!
He looked out the window and asked what he should be looking for. "The details", I said. "Just about every industry in the world is represented from simply looking out a window. Pick one!"
I looked out and I could see cars, clothing, lighting, glass windows, grass, concrete, bicycles, in-line skates, potato chips, health care, telephones, cell phones, purses, knapsacks and the list could go on forever. Plus, all of those things have their own collection of things we can't see, but we know they exist (we can imagine them!). "The trick...", I said, "...is to pick a couple of related things and focus on them." Why see the big picture when you can focus on the details?
Creative Visualization & The Law of Attraction
There's nothing wrong with seeing yourself as who you want to be or believing that maintaining a positive mental attitude will inevitably bring you riches of some sort. Some people swear by The Secret (a lot of which had been written about in Think and Grow Rich many decades before) and others think it's a silly marketing idea because things can't just manifest themselves if you think about them hard enough.
As ethereal as the concept seems, though, I know for sure that we do become what we think about most. It doesn't just 'happen' out of thin air, but eventually it will manifest itself. So, it appears that the intangible concepts need to be paired with tangible actions in order to see them become fruitful.
There's nothing wrong with seeing yourself as who you want to be or believing that maintaining a positive mental attitude will inevitably bring you riches of some sort. Some people swear by The Secret (a lot of which had been written about in Think and Grow Rich many decades before) and others think it's a silly marketing idea because things can't just manifest themselves if you think about them hard enough.
As ethereal as the concept seems, though, I know for sure that we do become what we think about most. It doesn't just 'happen' out of thin air, but eventually it will manifest itself. So, it appears that the intangible concepts need to be paired with tangible actions in order to see them become fruitful.
Excitement can be fueled by words. I know, because I have read many ideas in books, magazines, websites and even a 'quote of the day' day-timer. I studied the most popular self-help gurus, the top philosophers, cosmology, business leaders and even some physicists. Way back in 1995, I needed something that I wasn't getting. I needed something electric.
I was looking for permission to expand beyond the fence I had set up around myself. Through a constant pursuit of knowledge over a period of a two and a half years, something finally clicked in me and I hit the ground running. All of that reading and studying paid off - it was like I was zapped by jumper cables that made me quickly take the fence apart and go down a road I had never been on before.
At every milestone, there stood an image of myself that I had once pondered, as if it were welcoming me to that point in my life. Heck, if I can dream it up and it becomes real, I haven't got time for living vicariously through others.
- Buck Moore
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