‘Live your life, young mind!’ This has been the tagline of my blogsite for years. Last year, I changed it to ‘Live your dreams with love’ then lately, I reverted to that original line, ‘Live your life, young mind!’
But whichever tagline it would be, life is all about living our lives. In my journey as a young mind, trying to make sense of what living is, I learned that there are three types of living: living lost, living low, and living large.
Living Lost. It is sad to hear stories of lives lived without its real essence. A life that is lived without purpose. People are throwing their life in senseless living.
I was once coaching a young man in his speech of life testimony. Before he turned his life around, he was living lost. He was drowning himself in different kinds of drugs. He was an addict. There was another woman who was sharing her life that was filled with pretensions, insecurity and lies. This led her to get buried in debt. She almost got imprisoned for defrauding the people around her.
This may have been caused by a lot of things – problematic upbringing or problematic surrounding that led to problematic thinking. They lost their sense of identity. This happens in different forms and events. It is sad. They have forgotten their truth: that they are children of God, that they are loved no matter what.
This can be recovered by reestablishing their identity, reconnecting to the Lord, and get bonded with love once again.
Living Low. It is sad to witness lives lived in mediocrity. A life that simply drifts. A life that just goes with the wind. It is not necessarily wasted but the potential is not unleashed.
It is not that he is lost but he has no direction either. He is just drifting. He just goes where the wind blows. He has no compass. He does not adjust his sails when necessary.
He may have settled to this because he suffered a few failures and he allowed this failures to define him rather than learn from them. He forgot that failures are events not definitions. Other are living low because they were brought up with small thinking.
There is a need to break out from this certain belief system and create a new one. The person has to realize that he has the potential of a champion. After all, he was born to life for a reason. Sacred one, that is.
Living Large. It is with joy to live a life with purpose, with direction, with presence and vibrancy. With the Guidance of the Divine. It is not necessarily living a wealthy life, but living a ‘rich’ life. Not necessarily in material things but in the significant areas of life. This is not to discount the importance of material wealth but rather it puts on greater weight to those that are much more important while not disregarding other life’s essentials.
Living large is living with direction, with love and hunger to serve. It is living that is filled with the right attitude, ambition, and actions.
A person who is living large has established his identity. He has a direction. He has goals to pursue. He wants to have more, do more, and be more. He has a dream of living a lifestyle that he wants and to be the best he can be. He may not be there yet but he strives for it. It is not because he has tons of wealth, but because he desires and moves to serve and create more value for himself, his loved ones and other people.
It does not necessarily mean that he has cars, cash and cash-cows, but he may have those, too. It does not necessarily mean that he has reached the status of statuses, though he may have done so. What is important is that he desires, strives and moves toward that direction. His beliefs, choices and actions are directed to that.
To live large, it is important to go back to Who put you into this world in the first place, why, and how you should fulfill that why and bring it to fruition.
While most of us are not living lost, we might fall into the trap of living low. But life does not have to be boring in living it low. Life can be lived with zest and vibrancy. Life can be large if we put in specialness in the simple, magnificence in the mundane, and awesomeness in the ordinary. When we do so, we will live not a boring life but a blissful life.
Let’s go, live large!
(Chris Dao-anis, as an author and speaker, helps aspiring and young professionals become better communicators and leaders. His first book ‘The Gift of the Ordinary’ is available at Mt. Cloud Bookshop, Casa Vallejo, Upper Session Road, Baguio City and in Central Bookstores in Cebu and Metro Manila. For talks, seminars or speech coaching, email him at chrisdaoanis@ymail.com. You can also help him publish his third book by pre-ordering your copy. Visit www.chrispoweracademy.com/livinglarge.)
