Mindset Mondays with DTK – Ep #176 — This One is “Musty”!
OK. I know! I’m not a fan of “must” … It’s one of the “shouldy” words: should, must, need to, have to, ought to … they ALL have an external locus of influence, of direction, of power. They diminish our ability to make decisions by ceding our power and surrendering our agency.
AND, nonetheless, with all of that said … today’s quote is a good use of the word ‘must.” Dare I say … a “brilliant use” of the word?
“We must be willing to let go of the life we planned so as to have the life that is waiting for us.”
— Joseph Campbell
From my earliest dreams of the future (5 year old David wanted to be Speed Racer), the plans I made were all brilliant and, of course, flawless. Well, in my head they were. For most of them, the first encounter with reality heralded their demise. As the old adage goes: “no plan survives contact with the enemy” (adapted from Helmuth von Moltke).
Consider ‘must’ in this case to be a synonym for “compelled to.” And, to land that idea, consider the caterpillar and the butterfly. In order for the caterpillar to become what she will, in order for her to have the life that is waiting for her, she must let go of what she is. Eckhart Tolle pointed this out rather bluntly: “What a caterpillar calls the end of the world, we call a butterfly.”
I loved my career in hospitality. And my career in technology. I spent over a decade in the former and nearly two decades in the latter. And had I not let go of who I was over those 28 years, how could I be living the life I have created (and continue to create) today?
Like last week, that release was another necessary ending. The man I was finally became compelled to let go of the life he had created in order to make room for the expansive world that awaited him. That awaited ME.
What “must” I let go of next?
What must you let go of in order to emerge into the life that is awaiting you?
When will you free yourself FOR yourself?
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