I’ve been reflecting on something a longtime friend told me earlier in the week.
“Don’t be ashamed of your story. God rarely leads in a straight line.”
Life may have had some twists and turns along the way. It may not have gone or been going the way you thought it should or hoped it would.
All you’ve done or been through up to this point has played a part in your Ikigai story.
I look at my career and think of being in radio/TV, a United States Marine, an engineer, or an executive. All ended in some way and yet none were failures or the wrong thing.
Each of these experiences offered new insights, learnings, and helped shape, in part, who I have become.
All too often, our inner voice weighs in to judge. It’s a bit like what Jean Cocteau was talking about when he said…
“The course of a river is almost always disapproved of by its source.”
🌱 What if, instead of judging, you embraced the story of the crooked path?
🌱 What if it’s okay that life has turned out differently than you planned?
🌱 How might embracing your story in this way change the next chapter?
🌱 How might that lead you to your Ikigai?
I LOVE that Cocteau quote! I've always felt that to some extent, but it wasn't until I really leaned in to where I had come from, and what experience had made me into, that I was really able to dump any regret and use what I had as a treasure chest.
ps - wherever that road in the photo is, man would I have lived to get my roadster on it! 😉 )
I often say that there are are many things I would rather not have experienced or done, but they are a part of what made me the person I am today. Without those instances, I would be different, maybe someone I was less happy being. I have come a long way, and I like the person I am becoming (it's a process that isn't finished yet).