“If you don’t prioritize your life, someone else will.” —Greg McKeown from ‘Essentialism: The Disciplined Pursuit of Less’
In times of confusion and difficulty, often the only things we have to fall back on are our principles, our beliefs, and those things we hold to be most essential in our lives. While it is in times of trial and hardship that these become most apparent, it is in the good times, in the times of plenty, when our options are many, that we should contemplate and prioritize what is most important to us lest we find ourselves distracted by choices and possibilities unable to decipher what is essential from what is not.
When things are going well, we should always take a moment to step back and ask ourselves what of the things we have now we can live without. If we can learn to do this during the good times, doing so during the bad times will not be as difficult. We must all know for ourselves what is essential to our survival, our well-being, and our quality of life versus what is simply desirable and pleasurable.
By focusing on what matters most to us, even when we have everything, we will have more clarity when we experience loss. Without knowing this truth about our lives, it may be determined for us at some point by misfortune, unforeseen circumstances, or other people’s choices. It is infinitely better to choose to live with less when we can than to not know how to live with less when we must.
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 (artist unknown, unless otherwise noted).
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Often, the struggle we face in our lives is between what other people want from us and what we actually want for ourselves.
When we are young, we are told that we can be anything we want to be when we grow up, but, as we get older, we are also told that we must conform to expectations in order to fit in, get ahead, and be successful. Over time, we discover that what we want to do is not necessarily the same as what we must do, nor is who we want to be necessarily the same as who we must be. As the realities of life creep in, these lines begin to blur and it is easy to lose sight of who we were before we were told who to be.
The more responsibilities we acquire in our lives, the more difficult we may find it is to separate what is needed to satisfy others from what is needed to satisfy ourselves. As we struggle to find balance, there is always a risk of moving too far in one direction or another. If we move too far toward expectations, we may lose our own identity, but if we move too far away from them, we may lose our community, but we need both.
The goal should be to pursue and embrace the ideas, traits, and desires that make us unique in a way that also benefits the people around us, such that we are adding value to and also influencing our community though our creativity, passions, and perspectives, not in spite of them. If our community does not support us in this, we have to determine whether it is our ideas or our environment that needs to change, making sure that we move forward in the direction of what is healthy, righteous, and true.
Holistic Budo: As it is in budo, so too it is in life. As it is in life, so too it is in budo.
Be the person you need to be and the person you want to be will adapt.
It would be nice if we could all just ‘be ourselves’ without consequences, if everybody liked, loved, and respected us no matter how we behaved. Unfortunately, the people who count on us, those we serve, need us to show up in ways that are often very different than who we think we are or want to be.
When there is disparity between our self image and necessity, when these things do not not align, if we err on the side of service and necessity, our self image will adapt. Adaptation, after all, is the essence of evolution. If we are not evolving, if we are not growing and changing to meet and overcome the demands of our environment, we are stagnant and stagnation means death.
The persons we imagine ourselves to be are, more often than not, only shadows of our true selves and our true potential. Our imagined selves can never grow beyond these shadows without light shone on them. The light we need in order to see and grow past the limitations of our imagined selves is friction and feedback from our relationships.
In other words, we need conflict. We need to be challenged. Then, we need to rise to the challenge, but this requires us to change.
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
Artwork by Ana, except where 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 