Got to live a bigger life (and pee when you have to)
I just finished watching the tape of last night’s show about Oprah Winfrey’s Leadership Academy for Girls in South Africa. Did any of you see that?
CRY, CRY, CRY.
What a tearjerker! And so hopeful, and so inspiring, and such living proof that one person–yes, one person with millions and millions of dollars, but let us all remind ourselves that she didn’t start that way, she started as a poor girl in Mississippi in a house exactly like these South African girls’ with no electricity and no running water–one person can make an earth-shaking difference in the lives of one or a hundred and fifty or however many we can gather in.
How can you not come away from that show thinking how little some of us do on a day to day basis? Sure, I give to charity, and I try to be generous with my time, and I try to be loving, try, try, try–but sometimes you have to come up with the biggest dreams possible, and then start moving in that direction whether or not what you’re dreaming seems even remotely possible.
I’m not just talking about change-the-world kinds of dreams. I’m also talking about change-your-world kinds of dreams. Dreams like becoming a novelist, or owning a company, or going back to school and earning a Ph.D. I’m talking about deciding to make your family an oasis of love and acceptance and peace in the middle of whatever chaos is out there. Or maybe it’s just deciding to make your own peace and health and well-being the priority for once. Whatever it is, it’s the BIG dream you have and you’re not pursuing because it seems too big or too much trouble (even being kind to yourself can seem like too much trouble sometimes, can’t it?).
I set a goal for myself to become a novelist. Now I am. I have another goal to become a screenwriter. I will be. I set a goal to improve my health and to feel as good as possible in my body every single day, and most days I can come pretty close. And lots of other dreams that I won’t bore you with (until some other post, that is).
But as big as those dreams were at the time I made them–and as wonderful as it’s been to see them come true–I can’t ever be done. There’s so much more to work toward, both personally and globally.
I don’t know what my REALLY, REALLY BIG thing will be yet. I have this overarching goal to make a massive positive difference in as many lives as possible during my lifetime and beyond. That’s just a rough outline. What the details of that are, I can’t say yet. I feel that the girls of this world are my people. I want to protect them and inspire them and help them along in whatever way I can. I want to be a sort of “moving sidewalk” for them–you know, like in the airports. I want them to do the walking, but I’d sure like to be the force underneath that propels them at a faster pace so they can go further more easily.
All I can do right now is declare myself open to the possibilities. Some day I’ll hear something or read something and know that that’s where I need to throw my efforts. Until then I’ll keep doing the baseline stuff, giving money to causes I believe in, encouraging young people to value their lives and make the most of them.
I realize some of you might be thinking, “Okaaaayy . . .,” but maybe some others will think, “Yeah, I want that, too.” Whatever “that” is for you. “That” might be something as simple as deciding today to make a project out of treating yourself as the fine treasure you are. It may sound strange, but one of the most profound things I did for myself along those lines was decide that I was going to pee when I had to. Profound? Well, yeah. Because it’s just a small thing, but every time I sat here at my desk or in a movie theater or at someone’s house and I felt how much I needed to pee but just kept sitting there trying to ignore it, I was telling myself I didn’t matter to me. I was telling my body that I didn’t trust it to take care of me. And teaching my body that it couldn’t trust me to take care of it.
So I started there, then went on to the food part. What did my body want to eat? Why didn’t I make a pact to always go out and get that for it, whether my body wanted a big white chocolate macadamia cookie or a banana or Thai food?
What do peeing and Thai food and Oprah’s school for girls have to do with each other?
It’s all about making up your mind to do things better today than you did yesterday. To wake up to your own life and start making the necessary changes to go from where you are now to where you dream of being a month from now, and then a year and five years from now.
I’ve mastered the peeing thing. Now I need a bigger goal (um, obviously). It may take me ten years to accomplish whatever this thing is, but I’m willing to start down that path right this second.
Starting with doing my taxes this afternoon. Because if I’m going to be a multi-millionaire philanthropist one day, I should probably know how much money I owe the government this year.
Technorati Tags: Oprah Winfrey, Oprah Winfrey’s Leadership Academy for Girls, Life Goals, Motivation, Life List
My son decided that he wants to live on Saturn when he grows up and he wants me to come live near him. I’ve tried convincing him that the scenery is better on Mars, but he seems set on Saturn.
So, I guess I am going to live on Saturn later on in life.
I figure his goals were also appropriate since he seems to have a peeing issue too. Has to go the second his bedroom door is closed at bedtime. Surprisingly, he is in danger of a leak even though he pee’d 3.2 minutes ago.
Robin, since multi-millionaires do not pay taxes (Warren Buffet said so) you should skip paying taxes this year so you take another step towards your goal.
My Okaaaayy came after the peeing part.
Yeah Patrick I know what is coming, you’re too cool to pee.
It does not matter what dream you live as long as you live YOUR dream.
Patrick, tell your boy he has a job with me in ten years.
It does not matter what dream you live as long as you live YOUR dream. Herb, thanks for saying that. You’re so right.
I strongly suspect we’ll all be working for him by then.
Hmm. I never really had an “Ookaaaaay…” moment…it all made sense to me.
The world seems to have this attitude of “If you can’t top {insert person with mountains of cash to spare and the publicity to see every dollar of it spent}, don’t even try.”
There are some seriously conflicting messages, too. It seems to swing between
“You’re just one of the billions. You don’t matter enough.”
and
“It’s all about you. You, you, you! You do whatever you want, no matter who it hurts. Free speech and all that jazz, yanno?”
Shouldn’t it be, “You might not be able to reach {charity-tycoon}, but try. Wouldn’t it be cool if you did?”
and “You matter to at least one person: yourself. Act like it and take care of yourself.”
and “You do whatever you want, no matter who it helps!”?
The world we live in is twisted.
Thank you, Robin, for straightening it out a little.
Miri, thank you, thank you. Glad to find like-minded people. And glad to hear your take on it–I like how you put it.
Herb, I don’t pee, I go potty.
There are a few resistance pockets left,
Patches of shade the sun has not struck,
But mostly the universe is transformed.
RUMI – a few lines from “The Other Thing”
Interpret how you wish, but it seems to fit in this conversation. Are we resisting change or is change resistng us? Are we resisting our dreams or are our dreams resisting us?
Let’s all go live on Saturn and potty whenever we want.
That Rumi poem is lovely. Don’t know about Saturn, though. Potty, yeah, for sure.
Robin, Not everyone cool has to live on Saturn, just most of us.
“It does not matter what dream you live as long as you live YOUR dream.”
Unless you have an itch for world domination…
Oo, good point. That’s always the problem with those “I’ll save the world by taking it over” schemes.
Let’s try to confine our good deeds to helping people in ways they’d like to be helped. ‘Kay?
Actually, no one seems to mind my world domination.
As I said when I finally became Lord of the Universe
1. Go about your business.
2. Don’t get hit by an asteroid.
3. No, I won’t have him turned into a casaba melon.
So, you see, while I rule the universe, I like to delegate and not micro-manage, but ultimately you can hold me responsible for anything.
Wisdom from Buffy the Vampire Slayer:
“The hardest thing in this world is to live in it.”
I would add to that “…in a way that makes you happy and doesn’t destroy someone else.”
Our goals are, unfortunately, not just our own. Unless your goal is to die alone and unloved, you’re going to need other people to help along the way. Which means that you have to interact with others, whose goals may conflict with your own.
We are not masters of our own destinies. We ARE masters of deciding if we’re going to give up or not. That’s what matters.
Patrick, I’d vote for you.
Barry, thanks for adding all that. I agree about interacting with others–and I think that’s the fun part. It seems like once you start heading in a certain direction, you get to meet all these new people along the way who share your ideas and hopes.
Yeah, very Wizard of Ozish, but still true.
I love that you think I became The Space Lord through an election.
It makes my world domination seem much more acceptable.
Hail Patrick! I worship the ground that your quill covered six toed feet have traveled.
oooh, good moving sidewalk analogy.
This whole cultural fixation on MOOLAH is bizarre to me, and I have a lot of trouble understanding it. Probably because I don’t have a TV and am a true child of the “Back to the Earth” movement of the early 70′s.
I also notice that those who have the dough and prestige to get things done are usually the biggest targets for the type of ridicule that works against what they’re trying to do. For instance the recent headlines on “An Inconvenient Electric Bill” re Al Gore.
So maybe Warren Buffett had the right idea in giving most of it away.
Robin, this blog, if it can find its way in front of that young audience you wish to help, would go a long way toward doing so. And I think if the folks you met in NYC have anything to do with it, that will happen. In fact, I’d be curious to hear from them what they think of your little corner of the blogosphere. I predict that within a year’s time you might need to move this blog to a dedicated server to handle the traffic, which is every dedicated blogger’s dream, whether they realize it or not.
Wow, BJ, thank you so much for your kind words! I hope that everything you’ve said will come true. I really would love to do whatever I can to help our next generation make the choices that will benefit all of us. I don’t understand how adults can be so dismissive of kids and teens, since before long they’re the ones who will rule the world.
I have tremendous hope for the future because of the kids I’ve met and read about. They’re a lot like the generation you grew up with, BJ, don’t you think?