Living Deliberately.
What does it mean?
Thoreau coined the phrase in his book, Walden or Life in the Woods. He wanted to live each moment of his Life to the fullest by studying and understanding what it meant to be alive and be a part of the great plan of Life. The core meaning hasn't really changed much over the years.
How many of you out there are truly able to enjoy your lives? Are you able to make conscious choices about the Life you are leading? Do you work to meet all your obligations - car payment, mortgage, credit card bills? Or are you able to work to benefit yourself and your loved ones and achieve the dreams and goals you would like to? Do you volunteer because you want to make a difference or because it is what everyone else is doing? Do you have the free time you'd like or is every spare moment monopolized by others' requests?
Living a Deliberate Life takes thought and planning and an active choice. The best way to start is to take pen to paper and write down what your goals are and how you see yourself achieving them. Then take action. If you can dream it, you can do it!
When it comes time to leave this Earthly plane of existence, will you be able to say you have no regrets about how you lived your life?
In the coming weeks, I will share with you how Hubby & I are Living Deliberately.
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4 comments:
Nature is key for me.
Oh, I am looking forward to hearing more about this. I am a very big fan of Thoreau. I find it a challenge to live this mindset especially now, but then when you read Walden you realize nothing has changed as much as we think. People were always motivated by the wrong things. Now more than ever I want to live this way, especially THINK this way and making it a habit.
Looking forward to hearing the secret of how to do it! Thoreau rocks, of course, but while he was "living deliberately" in supposed isolation at Walden Pond, his Mom and sister were washing his clothes and taking him meals. He also went into Concord and bummed a lot of meals at the Emersons apparently. In his book, he never mentioned the little detail of the support system he had going that helped to enable his introverted life experiment. I suppose he just took it for granted, like all men of his times including many still today.
What a great idea for a writing series, I'm looking forward to hearing more about your and hubby's adventures and life changes!
Joe and I have both always been people with simpler tastes and habits, but even we got washed away by the mountains of bills, debts and the costs of living and for a while were both working so much we only saw each other in passing. We've actively worked to change that and to be mindful of purchases, to pare back, to take time to get outside and to take pleasure in the simple and little things. We question every move we make now asking "Do we NEED this?" "Will we appreciate it for years to come or is it a fly by the seat of our pants thing?" "What's the real motivation here?"
It's tough sometimes, but well worth the effort. :)
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