When you found me, I wasn’t the same man.
I’m different now.
I love myself more.
I take better care of myself. I’ve been following my heart and letting it guide me towards the path I’m supposed to take. But the man you knew before, well, he wasn’t that way. He questioned everything. He couldn’t let go of anything. He was buried 6ft. deep in pain, anxiety, and suffering.
To be honest, I’m still digging myself out in ways.
There are remnants of the past that I’ve had to accept and work with. I’ve had to make decisions to give up some things that no longer served me. I’ve had to move forward in ways that will open me up to the possibilities of a greater future. But moving forward hasn’t always been the easiest. Its hurt in many ways, but I know the path is true and it has heart.
I think it’s easy to make the decision to stay in a comfortable place.
That comfortable place doesn’t necessarily mean that everything is good. Sometimes it means that you’re comfortable with what’s going on, even though it can be pretty chaotic. You get familiar with the devil in front of you.
That comfort zone though, it becomes a place of stagnation.
You don’t grow there.
You don’t make any moves.
You don’t make any changes.
Slowly but surely, there’s this internal anxiety that begins to build. Pressure. That pressure can mount into something destructive. I’ve been there. I’ve also cracked under that pressure. I’ve split apart and lit up in flames. It’s not the best feeling.
Yet, renewal like that can be some of the greatest learning experiences of your life. Sure they feel absolutely awful when you’re in them, but when you look back you really start to realize just how much you discovered during that time. Pain can make you feel very very alive even though you’re suffering. It’s that comfort zone again. When you’re in that place, you really don’t feel that much pain.
Facing your anxieties and fears…facing the challenges head on…facing the edges of your growth and taking chances all come with the price of growing pains.
Not bad pain, but good pain. Pain that shapes you and morphs you into something else. Once you head through that pain and you come out onto the other side of it, you are now a stronger person because of it. But first you have to head through that mud.
The lotus only comes after that.
I keep changing. It’s never going to stop.
I’ll keep diving into my books, deep into my practices and keep doing things that expand my heart and my mind. I think I never really understood when I was younger that life itself is the journey and you really have to forget about the destination because you really have no idea of what’s going to happen.
If you miss out on the things going on right now, then you’ve missed out on living completely.
So change your shape and form at will.
Change as much as you’d like.
You only have one shot at this.
Go for it.
Evan Sanders
The Better Man Project