Following rules has always been your strong suit.
Whether that means following your own rules, others’ rules, or a combination of both.
Following rules is safe.
You know what’s expected of you, therefore, you know exactly how to avoid messing up.
Rules keep your life orderly and neat.
The same goes for your goals.
You dream up a vision, break it down, and work out a system to create what you want {complete with a thick volume of rules to govern the game and WARNING labels to denote when you’re off track}.
As long as you’re playing by the book, you feel good—you feel like you’re making progress. You witness yourself getting closer to the thing you want because you hit milestones in the way the system predicted you would.
Except…
There inevitably comes a point where you fail the system and all hell breaks loose.
In one swift plot twist, you begin beating yourself into the ground instead of building yourself up. For all of the progress you’ve made, you’re now behind. So far behind. And you’re frustrated because now you have to back track so you can move forward as planned {except you’re still behind since there’s no rewind button in real life}.
Yep, the downward spiral is REAL. And it gets you every time.
Because, what you don’t calculate for is your very human-ness—the part of you that will mess up. The part of you that is designed to stray off track. The part of you that isn’t a carefully calculated rule-following super machine.
If this is hitting home for you right now, we have a lot in common.
Two weeks ago, I scheduled a four and a half mile run. {I’m training for a half-marathon in May}. It would have been my longest run yet and I was READY. I was pumped. Except—about a mile in, it became clear that while my mind was ready, my body wasn’t.
Cue: The downward spiral.
I pushed myself through another mile, hoping to settle into a rhythm where running felt like walking. By mile two, I knew the run was doomed. There was no way I could keep going and all I could think about was how stopping would mess up my training schedule.
Slowing to a walk, I felt like I had failed. That is, until a question blasted through the chaos: WHO ON EARTH SAYS I NEED TO RUN THIS ENTIRE FOUR AND A HALF MILES?
The Rule I was playing by—that’s who. The system stated “running,” not “walking.”
In that moment of clarity, I chose to finish my run {and reach my milestone anyways} with a combination of running and walking. Take that, Rule.
As I left the gym, I started to wonder: Where else does this show up? What are the unconscious rules I’ve decided I need to follow in order to make my dreams a reality?
Now, I’m not saying that all rules are ineffective or unsupportive, but when they become limiting versus empowering, they can wreak havoc and take us AWAY from the very thing we want to create.
They stop serving us and it’s at this point where we get decide what does. We get to overwrite the system and experiment with something different.
Nothing is set in stone unless you choose for it to be.
After all, isn’t it really about your commitment to creating what you want versus how it needs to happen?
With light, love, & breaking rules,
-Kayla
Words & Wisdom
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