{"id":1066,"date":"2012-08-19T16:07:27","date_gmt":"2012-08-19T14:07:27","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/otitijasmine.com\/?p=1066"},"modified":"2012-08-19T16:07:27","modified_gmt":"2012-08-19T14:07:27","slug":"what-are-you-willing-to-give","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.otitijasmine.com\/otitijasmine.org\/2012\/08\/19\/what-are-you-willing-to-give\/","title":{"rendered":"What Are You Willing to Give?"},"content":{"rendered":"

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What are you willing to give to get where you want to be? <\/span><\/p>\n

What are you willing to give to be<\/em> who you want to be? <\/span><\/p>\n

What are you willing to give to shake things up and grab hold of the silver lining? <\/span><\/p>\n

Time? <\/span><\/p>\n

Money? <\/span><\/p>\n

Effort? <\/span><\/p>\n

Dedication? <\/span><\/p>\n

Your life? <\/span><\/p>\n

How about everything: throwing yourself, all<\/em> of yourself, into living true to your soul’s purpose? <\/span><\/p>\n

How about it? <\/span><\/p>\n

What are you willing to give?<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

The funny thing about putting yourself out there is leaving your heart open to failure or success. We spend so much time avoiding failure or at least trying to minimise it, and not nearly enough time anticipating success. <\/span><\/p>\n

“Don’t get your hopes up too high.” “Be realistic with your expectations.” “Know your boundaries.” <\/span><\/p>\n

That’s all rather stifling, isn’t it?<\/span><\/p>\n

It’s less about the outcome and more about the process. Results are great, yes, but what about the steps to get there? Are you having fun and enjoying the ride, or dragging yourself through a soul-numbing routine because you’re so attached to a particular outcome?<\/span><\/p>\n

Pouring ourselves into projects is in our DNA. It’s who we are. It’s why blogs and books and movies and albums are released every other day. I daresay \u00a0there’s enough material to be read, watched, and heard even if all production halted today<\/span>, but that wouldn’t keep us happy for long. We’d still want more. So much more.<\/span><\/p>\n

Once you’re old enough to do more than eat, sleep, cry, and soil your diaper, you start to explore. You begin making connections between cause and effect and interacting with your world in a whole new way.<\/span><\/p>\n

You need something to do. You always need something to do. And time and again you find yourself fretting and up to your hairline in busywork, nowhere<\/em> near where you could be if you just slowed down and asked yourself one little thing: “Why am I doing this?”<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n

I read Dyana Valentine’s<\/a> post I am\/not confused<\/a>\u00a03 days ago. It really made me stop and ask myself if I was clear on my ‘why’. Why do I blog? Why do I share? Why do any of this when I can choose to do something else? Like Dyana says, “If we don’t know our why, then what we do is basically irrelevant.”<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

The questions about my why brought me up short because my answers aren’t the same as they were a few months ago. I’m not even sure I know what they are anymore. All I do know is I have to be willing to stay loose and fluid as I move through the maze in my mind so I can get where I need to go.<\/span><\/p>\n

What about you?<\/span><\/p>\n

It’s in our blood to explore, to imagine, to create. It’s in our blood to slide into the process as often as we can and get something fresh out of it each time. It’s within our power to do the work and have a damn good time while we’re at it.<\/span><\/p>\n

But sometimes there are tough choices ahead: delicious uncertainty vs. a clear + dreary path; stagnant comfort vs. the thrill of growth; hiding away vs. showing up.<\/span><\/p>\n

How do you handle those tough choices?<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

The gist of Dyana’s post reminds me of Simon Sinek’s<\/a> fascinating TEDx<\/a> talk How great leaders inspire action<\/a>. Simon talks about the impact your why has on your world. It opens people up to you. It attracts<\/em> others who believe what you believe, who accept your thoughts and ideas and projects because those things speak directly to the limbic brain (controls behaviour and feelings), which exerts a magnetic pull on their attention. They’re moved<\/em> to care<\/strong> about why you do what you do and support you in it.<\/span><\/p>\n

[ted id=848]<\/p>\n

Your why has to be something that stirs your blood, something you truly believe in, something that makes your nerves tingle and itch to get started. It’s got to be something you’re willing to invest in, even when people say or think you’re wrong. Even when you’re the only one crazy enough to think it’ll work at first. Even when you’re tired and aching for rest, but still choose to soldier on.<\/span><\/p>\n

What are you willing to give to discover your why and act on it?<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

Decide for yourself what you’re willing to give, what you’re going<\/em><\/strong> to give, and go do it all. Balls to the wall.<\/span><\/p>\n

Image credit:<\/span> Karen Salmansohn<\/a><\/p>\n

51.045925<\/span>7.01922<\/span><\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

What are you willing to give to get where you want to be? What are you willing to give to be who you want to be? What are you willing to give to shake things up and grab hold of … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[20,21,28],"tags":[45,62,64,143,164],"class_list":["post-1066","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-moxie-soul-fire","category-open-heart","category-star-power","tag-brilliance","tag-discover-your-why","tag-dyana-valentine","tag-simon-sinek","tag-willing-to-give"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.otitijasmine.com\/otitijasmine.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1066","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.otitijasmine.com\/otitijasmine.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.otitijasmine.com\/otitijasmine.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.otitijasmine.com\/otitijasmine.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.otitijasmine.com\/otitijasmine.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1066"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.otitijasmine.com\/otitijasmine.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1066\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.otitijasmine.com\/otitijasmine.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1066"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.otitijasmine.com\/otitijasmine.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1066"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.otitijasmine.com\/otitijasmine.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1066"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}