More specifically, not every problem requires a solution from you.
Some things are better left alone.
Maybe they will work out.
Maybe they will not.
You cannot and should not concern yourself with all of the world’s troubles.
Your time, energy, and attention are limited.
You need to prioritize your resources.
Focus on what and who you can help, but never at the cost of what and who you must help.
An inability to prioritize will spread you thin, pulling you away from that which needs you most, and making you less effective for what truly matters.
In our youth, we feel as if our internal resources are infinite.
It feels like we will live forever and can do just about anything.
As you get older, however, you begin to realize that you have a limited amount of time, energy, and attention to give away each day.
And when you reach your capacity, when you have no more of yourself to give, in order to add some new task, goal, or relationship to your life, something else must be sacrificed.
The resources you need for this new focus must come from somewhere and so, in order to add some new thing to your life, you will have to give less of yourself in some other area.
If you do not withdraw your time, energy, or attention from some external aspect of your life, you will be pulling from the resources that should be reserved for your health.
And this is unsustainable.
You must, therefore, learn how to prioritize the allocation of your internal resources, and to give less of yourself to that which matters least so that you can give more of yourself to that which matters most.
Some of the world’s greatest innovations were borne out of necessity and limited resources.
Limitations do not have to be seen as restrictive boundaries within which we are stuck and unable to escape. With a shift in mindset, away from hopelessness and toward creative solutions, our limitations, whether they be time, tools, or resources, actually become our muse, the source from which our inspiration arises. By accepting our limitations, we give ourselves permission to harness them to our advantage instead of being bound by them to our detriment.
When necessity demands that we act, either for our physical survival or our existential fulfillment, we must take stock of the time, tools, and resources we have at our disposal and determine how to best use these to achieve our goals. What we have may be all that we get. This may be the palette from which we must paint our masterpiece.
In reality, the difference between a novice and an expert is not the materials one or the other has at his or her disposal, but the way that they are utilized and to what effect. The dividing line between success and failure is drawn by creativity. It is our ability to bring creative solutions to the table and to execute them in spite of our limitations, whether natural or circumstantial, that determines our usefulness in service to both our community and to our ideas themselves.
Holistic Budo: As it is in budo, so too it is in life. As it is in life, so too it is in budo.
Robert Van Valkenburgh is co-founder of Taikyoku Mind & Body and Kogen Dojo where he teaches Taikyoku Budo and Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu.
All photos by Robert Van Valkenburgh unless otherwise noted.
If you found this post helpful or meaningful in some way, please feel free to Share, Comment, and Subscribe below.
Meditations on God 