Ok, I'm supposed to finish my blog from Friday by explaining my theory as to why everything always has to be great for us to feel anything. Sorry, you'll have to wait until tomorrow for that commentary. (In the "industry", they call that a teaser :-)). Instead, I feel the need, as I'm sure many others are doing, to comment on the Olympics.
It may not be true of every household, but ours is always captivated by the Olympics. Something new, something exciting, hopes for Gold. Yesterday was "Super Sunday" as labelled by Canadian broadcasters. Lots of great events, lots of dreams of standing on the podium. The day started with tragic news: the mother of one athlete had passed away overnight. As if an omen, Canadians one by one disappointed their expectant audiences: we had been told to expect Gold in this event, at least a medal showing in that event, definitely a win in hockey. Not that I am complaining about our athletes' performances, trust me, I didn't even have the courage to watch when they showed the helmet-cam pictures of the ski-cross event; I think our athletes are two parts physical geniuses and one part crazy! Hats off to them!
But I want to comment on another aspect: expectation. If you do a bit of reading on eastern thinking, we should prepare for great events and then be ready for greatness to happen...but to have NO expectations. I've always struggled with this. A long time ago someone told me that the one word I needed to fully understand before I could be at peace with myself and the world was "surrender". Surrender to what will happen, to what will not happen. So, how do you balance that with all the talk about visualizing your desired results? We're supposed to focus on what we want (à la Law of Attraction) but at the same time surrender to the possibility of it not happening? Sorry, I'm confused...
This is tough thinking early in the morning...but I think maybe I have a glimpse of an idea of what this is all about. Maybe I'm being too literal. Maybe the visualization is not so specific (I'm watching this particular Canadian athlete receiving the gold medal), maybe it's more general (I'm watching our athletes cheer about how great they did, regardless of the outcome). Maybe it's not the catalog that Joe Vitale talks about in The Secret (you turn the pages and pick the things, people and experiences that you want to live), maybe it's more about picking the emotions you want to feel, the satisfactions you need to experience, the "wins" you wish to accomplish.
So I'm going to test this today (you can play along too, if you wish). I'm going to visualize getting a phone call that is going to make me yell "YES!!!!!" when I hang up. And a feeling of satisfaction at 4pm for a challenging piece of work I needed to complete. And a sudden reason to smile at 7:30 tonight. These are my expectations for the day. I'll let you know tomorrow how it all turned out.
(p.s., if you have thoughts about how to align eastern thinking with western living, please feel free to comment!)
