“When you’re living by default, you’re automatically reacting to life in habitual ways, many of which may be limiting you and your life. In contrast, living deliberately means making more conscious and constructive life choices. When you’re living deliberately, you’re living from a position of responsibility; you’re making choices with greater awareness. You’re taken yourself off autopilot, so you’re better prepared to align your actions with the results you want to achieve.” – Lauren Mackler from her book Solemate: Master the Art of Aloneness and Transform Your Life

As Yogi Berra reminds us, “You’ve got to be very careful if you don’t know where you are going, because you might not get there,” and so it is true of creating the life of your dreams. In order to curate it, you must know what it is, what it looks like, what it feels like, what it entails. And once you know what it is you want, you must be willing to live consciously each day to achieve it.

 While it will require an immense amount of discipline, focus and letting go of things once part of your life, but after close examination realized they weren’t aiding in your quest, choosing to live deliberately will be beyond-expectations rewarding.

In Lauren Mackler’s book Solemate: Master the Art of Aloneness and Transform Your Life, she offers details reasoning and results for living deliberately rather than by default. And while her focus is primarily on those who choose to live alone or are currently living alone, the act of living deliberately enhances the quality of one’s life regardless of one’s company or relationship status. Because when we seek out that which speaks to our passions, satiates our purpose and inspires us to wake up each morning with excitement rather than dread, the relationships we build – platonic or otherwise – are richer because we have chosen to engage in them rather than blindly fall into them.

After reading Mackler’s book, I’m convinced it is a wonderful guidebook for every single person to read, as she discusses the barriers we have around us that we don’t even realize (limiting beliefs) and provides guidance on how to identify and then create new operating systems that are crucial for contentment.

However, whether you read her book or not, when you decide to put yourself in the driver’s seat of your own life, choosing who and what you welcome into your life and how you respond to everyday events, you will see progress toward the goals you have set for your life whether it is to attain a certain career, learn a new skill, build stronger relationships or fall in love with your life again.

So today, turn off the autopilot, examine your habits, your daily routines and assess whether they are helping or hindering the development of the life you right now may only be dreaming about. Spending money unnecessarily rather than saving up for that down payment? Put yourself on a spending diet. Catching yourself engaged in negative self-talk, and wondering why your self-esteem is low? Learn to master your mind. After all, we are the curators of our own destiny, and each day is another opportunity to set the sails in the right direction.

Have a wonderful Monday.

~SIMILAR POSTS FROM THE ARCHIVES YOU MIGHT ENJOY:

• Concentrate Your Power 
• A Thinking Life = A Happy Life
• Why Not . . . Edit Your Life?