A Creed To Live By

At this early stage of the year with the holidays and New Year\’s celebrations still fresh in the mind many people have lofty ideas about what they\’d like to achieve and the changes that they\’d like to make.

Sadly, most New Year\’s resolutions are simply that – ideas – lacking in specifics, difficult to account for and often without properly thought through timelines. As a result, most \’resolutions\’ are broken surprisingly soon after the whole \’back-to-work,-school-and-life-as-usual\’ routine kicks in again.

In life coaching we advocate the setting of goals rather than simple resolutions and we have tools to ensure that professionally crafted goals have a great chance of being achieved.

But an easier way to bring about fundamental change in your life is to adopt a simple yet powerful creed to live by and – if you\’re serious about it – one that you can ask those close to you to hold you to!

While surfing the Internet one day I came across a wonderful little story, by an unknown author, with a short but inspiring message that offers exactly that … a simple yet powerful creed to live by.

I\’d like to share it with you. Even if you\’ve seen it before, I think you\’ll find it\’s worth reading again.
[box type=\”shadow\”]“A man’s got to have a code, a creed to live by.”

– John Wayne[/box]

A creed to live by (continued)

 

Life is like a cup of coffee

A group of alumni, highly established in their careers, got together to visit their old university professor. Conversation soon turned into complaints about stress in work and life.

Offering his guests coffee, the professor went to the kitchen and returned with a large pot of coffee and an assortment of cups – porcelain, plastic, glass, crystal, some plain looking, some expensive, some exquisite – telling them to help themselves to the coffee.

When all the students had a cup of coffee in hand, the professor said: \”If you noticed, all the nice looking expensive cups have been taken up, leaving behind the plain and cheap ones. While it is normal for you to want only the best for yourselves, that is the source of your problems and stress.

Be assured that the cup itself adds no quality to the coffee. In most cases it is just more expensive and in some cases even hides what we drink. What all of you really wanted was coffee, not the cup, but you consciously went for the best cups… And then you began eyeing each other\’s cups.

Now consider this: Life is the coffee; the jobs, money and position in society are the cups. They are just tools to hold and contain Life, and the type of cup we have does not define, nor change the quality of life we live.

Sometimes, by concentrating only on the cup, we fail to enjoy the coffee. Savor the coffee, not the cups!

The happiest people don\’t have the best of everything. They just make the best of everything.

Live simply. Love generously. Care deeply. Speak kindly.

How\’s that for a creed to live by this year … and every year?

 

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