Life calls a lot. It's like the annoying kid from second grade who called every hour on the hour to find out if it was finally a good time to come over and play.
When life has called me in the past, I've usually answered, responding to whatever it asks of me. Without asking any questions, I act as though I must always respond to it by letting it dictate my life to me, as if it knows what is best for me. Well, typically it doesn't know what's best for me.
I've concluded that if there are no boundaries set, life will keep calling and trying to get an unsuspecting victim to placate it by taking on its every demand.
In a perfect world, we all would be running our lives, rather than having our lives running us.
Living and acting intentionally is something that feels so significant. When I say intentional living, I mean living with real purpose.
To be honest, intent wasn't even a part of my daily vocabulary until fairly recently, like within the last year and a half. And it's been only within the last month that I've really come to terms with what it really even means to me.
So many people are stressed, fatigued, and just going through the motions because urgency has taken the place of inspiration. And with inspiration being the mother of personal power, we're in big trouble when we lose touch with inspiration.
When I stop downloading all the beckonings, threats, guilt trips and urgent memos from life, I can finally slip out of my head and move a little more into my heart. And at that point, I can take stock of how to regain inspiration and a sense of personal power.
Of course, when I come back from such a calm, yet extremely enlightening journey inward, there's always a new batch of important news flashes blinking furiously across my mental screen. They're just more urgent notes from life.
At least, at that point I have an idea of how to rein life in a little and make it obedient to the intention with which I'm moving. I sort my new memos from life, throwing out the irrelevant messages, delegating out what I can and moving forward with what is going to help me find my way back to inspiration and empowerment, even though it rarely is what life urges me to do.
Life forever sticks to what it knows. It doesn't let go. It doesn't make room for the new. It doesn't allow for reassessment of any situation. What fun is that, anyway? I can override all of that simply by living intentionally, understanding and acting on the totality of who and what I am, and thus being the master of my own life.
I started writing this disABILITY column almost 5½ years ago. I have covered a lot of ground since then in my own life and have shared what I felt was important to share with people. It's time for me to move on.
I will forever be a writer. That is who I am. And to life, that fact means I ought to continue forward with this column. But to me, continuing to write in this medium scatters and thins out my intentions for my writing too much.
I've shared what I came here to share. And now it is complete. Many people have expressed to me that I should write a book. Maybe it'll happen. My current intension is about recording the noteworthy things that happen, which could absolutely go in a book someday. But also, writing about my other passions, including personal development, alternative medicine and anything else that inspires me and lights up my creativity spectrum.
To follow my future ponderings and ramblings, you can find me at http://healthywisdom.wordpress.com.
Kate Pavlacka, a graduate of the State University College at Oneonta, has been totally blind for about a dozen years. Her columns can be found at www.thedailystar.com/disability.
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Living intentionally helps bring life under control
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She turns a scrutinous eye on herself, looking for opportunities to grow, and taking cross sections of herself to examine her growth rings through time.
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By Kate Pavlacka Recently I was challenged to come up with my biggest passion in life, and while it took me 2½ weeks of extensive consideration of what that might be for me, I came to the realization that my big passion in life is self-awareness.
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Don’t believe your thesaurus; it lies to you. -
disABILITY: Q&A on math, dreams, beauty, fear
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Here is the last edition of questions and answers. These are questions I’ve been asked by people of various ages through the years. The answers I share are from my perspective, experience and what I’ve learned over the years. -
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disABILITY: Make people focus on personality
It all started back in September. I was sitting on the floor of my living room with one of my female friends, moping around and exchanging stories of prior man troubles we both had experienced.
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disABILITY: Fear of change can be crippling
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disABILITY: Disabled, able-bodied very much alike
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disABILITY: 'Disabled' doesn't mean 'unskilled'
Did you know that blindness is the third-most feared thing in this country after AIDS and cancer, and keeps employment of the visually impaired limited to 26 percent of those ages 21 to 64?
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disABILITY: Perception, not sight, important in life
Would you rather be deaf or blind? That was a question posed on a website I was on recently.
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disABILITY: Flying is possible, even with full plate, if you take time for yourself
