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A friend is making a million bucks. But they are super sad. They feel trapped and have no time for themselves and the family.
You, on the other hand, just quit your job. Yes, the same one. To pursue your creative freedom. And you are happier than before. With maybe a few lesser bucks.

Money is important. And it does buy happiness. That’s a fact. However, if we are unable to use that money to buy happiness it is making us miserable. On the contrary, if we create happiness and then operate to work, somehow, somewhere, money takes care of itself.

If money brings happiness, so does happiness bring money.
Fortunately, being happy is an advantage no competitor could copy. It’s always a choice.

Rewind to a year back. All our plans were cancelled. Office and home came to the same premises. So did studies and play.

While the pandemic was a difficult year for many, it also gave rise to the best teachers. 

Those who were passionate in what they do. Those who understood what the students needed. Those who were willing to do the deep work – daily. Those who were willing to give up their notions in the process of learning. And most importantly – those who were willing to learn in the process of becoming a teacher.

Fast forward to a year after lockdown – we have the best teachers. Not because they were lucky, rather because they chose to learn. And give.

While teaching, the teacher learns the most.
In giving, the giver is always fulfilled.

I have done my work.
Just go through it.
And when there are errors, I will correct it.

This is sadly one of the reasons most of us do not end up becoming linchpins. Because instead of thinking over to become indispensable, we end up leaving our work undone and filled with errors. 

When our managers go through our work, instead of trusting it has been done well, they have to re-do it. And also perhaps re-do their definition of how responsible we are.

Our brand is built by what we do. And if we leave our work for others to give a finishing touch to, that is what a brand we are building on.

Our work is our signature. So are our errors.

We live in a trust deficient society.
Conditioned not to trust the delivery boy, the vegetable vendor or even the people in our team and our family.
Almost everyone operates like this.

Until one day, you decide to start from the other end: begin with trust.

Trust people for what they say. Trust them with their choices. Trust them to own the problem instead of pointing out. And you are baffled by how beautifully things have turned out to be! Most of the time they will keep your trust. 

However, if they don’t, it always helps to look at the stats of who did keep up to the trust instead of going against it. The numbers would still nudge you to never stop trusting!

If people betray your trust, it always helps to leave people instead of leaving who you are.

When we were growing up, we were never taught self love.
More than anything else, we were sadly made to feel guilty if we didn’t make others a priority.

This conditioning led to a habit where we have forgotten how to love ourselves.

If only we realized that the best gift we could give others is show them how to love themselves.
It will help them see themselves in the right light. And that’s priceless!

We can love others only if we learn how to express that pious emotion to our own selves.

I wanted to pursue this course but now it doesn’t make me happy.
But I loved this, so doing anything else won’t make me happy either.

This is a standstill most people arrive at, and they believe it is just that they don’t like it.

While the truth is, that the middle of everything is going to be messy. Things would look stagnant, self doubt will arise and others’ success will generate massive self doubt in you.

What helps in such situations is, having cognizance of daily progress and having a set schedule of habits that help you get there. When goals give up, process and progress protect. It is one of the best addictions humans have had and the addiction that saves so many dreams of humans.

You don’t need to give up on everything that is disillusioned. Having fun with struggling for what you love is equally an art.

No one has done this before.
You should do what everyone else is doing.
Don’t colour outside the lines.

Ever since we began to understand language, we have been given instructions on what to do! 

Except that we were rarely told why. Because of which it never made sense.

Why not do, what makes sense to us?
Why not live our own path?

It is going to be difficult to resist the world, however, you wouldn’t be a photocopy of what anyone else ought to be. And that’s priceless!

Your life path is yours for a reason: for you to not be a template of anyone else’s.

Competition could sometimes get bad.
And suck a lot of our valuable energy.
What we were supposed to expend on ourselves is now going towards bringing others down, even if unconsciously. 

What if we focussed only on our journey?
Even if others were in the same range, what if we put blinders on and never peeped into someone else’s track?

The energy that is going to be saved is phenomenal. What we expend on ourselves will help us even further.

To get to a place of zero competition, it never fails to be you. Because everyone else is already taken!

Why am I feeling this way?
Why am I sad?
Why am I angry?
What am I perpetually disturbed about?

When we sit and think about the answers to these questions, we get a step closer to knowing our motivations.
The awareness of why we feel what we feel, makes the feeling less necessary, less needed, and over time less effective.
Over time, we know ourselves through our feelings. 

In solitude we find our answers. In tagging along with the world, we are mostly left alone. 

If we choose a path that we resist, we know that we will struggle.
However, even if we choose a path that we love, we will struggle.

Struggle is a constant, needed to promote us to the next level. The question is, is the next level the one that we have chosen?

When struggle is a part of life, why not choose the one that will make us happy?