Every once in a while we all have those moments in life where our reflection is so clear that even the most stubborn sense of false reality can no longer make us feel secure in who we’ve become. This happens when we realize the goals we set for ourselves have somehow been lost or that we have let our personal obligations fall to the side. I can count at least two such occasions in my life where any self delusion of having it all together was shattered like a cold windshield doused with hot water. But then if I was being truthful with myself that number might be a tad bigger.
I once told my wife that the one thing I really wanted was to look back three years from now and say this is exactly where I thought I’d be three years ago. How is it that we let ourselves go so far off track in the first place? One reason we stray so often from our goals and obligations is quite simply because life happens and we forget to take the time to do periodic self checks. Performing a self check every once in awhile allows us to make sure we’re still on the road we intended and helps us make any small changes needed to ensure we don’t stray so far from our goals and obligations that they’re lost to life.
I’ve been going along for quite a while now without a good self check and it shows in the infrequency of my blog posts as well as the fact that I’ve not been living up to some of my obligations. Externally like most people I still maintain the illusion of being in control, but without a good self check even my external persona will be lost. The reason why an honest self check is so important in maintaining our goals is because without a sound understanding of the external factors, and what I like to call the unimportant important stuff, we will fall into the never ending loop of replacing old goals with new goals without ever actually accomplishing anything.Imagine how fulfilling life would be if you always met your goals and obligations. The truth is that no one can claim such an accomplishment. But by understanding external factors, performing periodic self checks and keeping our eyes on the horizon we can make our chances better than average. It can be easy to forget that the political structure in our country is such that with a government of the people by the people we more than anything need to have strong citizens first. I present for you here the argument that if you really want to improve our government and way of life as a whole, then the first thing you should do is improve yourself. I challenge you to choose just one goal and make it happen. I challenge you to make the hard decision to not let life get in the way of your obligations. And I further challenge you to share the difficulties and rewards of doing so with your children, so they can see how much better it is to not let life control who you are and what you stand for.
