Look carefully at this picture.
Do you see the words EL DORADO perched on a translucent building across the street?
It is a phantom of the glaring glow behind it, the real building.
That seems like a metaphor for something.
It seems like a metaphor for the meaning of life–a floating symbol of perfection, situated somewhere far away and inaccessible–somewhere that we’ll never get.
If that seems bleak, focus inward instead and consider the things you can alter for the better. As Bob Klein writes, “Whatever you pay a great deal of attention to will become a pivotal point around which your life will revolve.”
He goes on to explain how things affect us from without, such as living with other people, whose lives “begin to revolve around each other” and existing within particular belief systems, where “your behavior begins to revolve around those beliefs.” [As a non-Catholic working at a Catholic school, I can certainly attest to that.]
Bob Klein recommends the pivot-like practice of T’ai Chi. T’ai Chi creates swirls of momentum around your central core, or Tan-tien, like a “biological gyroscope.” It is amazing and you finish by feeling very peppy and centered. See video of Master Peng, in case you missed it.
Whether or not you begin practicing T’ai Chi in 2018, it is good to think about what we spend our attention on, that “pivotal point around which your life will revolve.” I’ll be doing T’ai Chi, for sure, because it is a living metaphor for my goal of peace. I aim for peace and harmony in the family (and in my own head), this year more than ever. If you knew us, you’d realize that is quite a lot! and it’s going pretty well for the first time in a long time, right now. 2018 will see my brothers and I–and our spouses–living in the same region for the first time in 34 years. With one son nearby and the other undecided where he’ll be.
2018 will see a move for our household and a new job, too, for me: from full-time to retired professor and from business nobody to founder and CEO of HGBG!
That’s a lot!
What are you seeing off in the distance in 2018? What do you hope for? Will it be money, like in Reno, Nevada where I took that picture of the El Dorado Hotel? Or do you deserve fame, at last? Or perhaps you’re thinking of living off the grid, and cultivating cyber-invisibility. Whatever it is, hope of some kind would be good. Pass it on, if you’ve got something good!
Daily Joy with Honey Girl 