Career and Entrepreneurship Blog, By Brett Farmiloe and Zach Hubbell » Blog Archive » Guest Post-What do you do when things don’t turn out the way you planned?

Guest Post-What do you do when things don’t turn out the way you planned?

May 30, 2007 | by brett | Permalink

Kimberly Pirtle is an intuitive life coach and holistic healer. She blogs about the power of positive thinking for creating bliss in our lives at http://www.uncoveryourbliss.com/blog/

Being wrong (or worrying that we will be wrong) about something as important as what we want to do with our lives is hard. It’s one of the fastest ways down the path of indecision and fear. What do we do if we invest time and money working towards a goal and then we get there and it’s not what we thought it would be? How can we trust ourselves if we took risks and now we’re headed down an uncharted path? Here’s the truth: That is life to its most basic definition. Life is change and the unexpected. Even if you live a charmed life and always know what you want to do and go out and do it you will be faced with unexpected events and people. I would go so far as to say that most of our meaningful living is done within the flow of change and unexpected events. Those are the times when we can’t run on autopilot and must call on who we are to find our way.

In fact, I propose that we toss the notion of being right or wrong out the window. We all have innate knowledge of what we want and our intuition will always lead us where we need to be. I’ll give you an example. I have a good friend who thought she really wanted a husband and a house and a traditional family life. The wrinkle is that she didn’t realize that her vision for herself was not true to who she really was. So she got the husband and the house and held on tight to her vision of wedded bliss desperately trying not to see that it wasn’t actually what she wanted. It didn’t just turn out to be the wrong man, it was the wrong life.

I’d be lying if I told you that realization wasn’t extremely painful for her. She had to deal with crushing disappointment and self-doubt, not to mention the What Now Syndrome. Eventually though, two huge life lessons came out of her experiences. First, she realized that it’s ok to change our minds. We’re allowed to decide that we don’t want something after all and be grateful that we were given the opportunity to find a new direction. Her intuition lead her to an amazing insight about who she is and it took on a form that could best teach her what she needed to know. Second, we are utterly and completely capable of having our dreams—whatever they are. She did get the house and the husband. Believing in lack of time and resources are an illusion we create to make it easier to give up and play it safe. There is enough time and resources for millions of dreams and if we hold the vision of unlimited abundance, every step is a step closer to who we really are and what we really want.

Life is not a destination—that’s why we don’t achieve a goal and then drop dead. We are hard-wired to want more, to be more, to do more. The way we grow is by unfailingly believing in ourselves and our intuition no matter where we end up. Big rewards come from big risks and it’s up to us to decide whether our personal happiness and fulfillment are worth emotional and physical bruises and scraped knees. If we accept the fact that life is full of the unexpected, and if we accept the fact that deep down we actually know what we want, all we have to do is consciously decide if we want to live in a state of fear or in a state of anticipation of everything that is coming to us. We can beat ourselves up for perceived failure, or we can embrace our dreams and strive for more. Which way do you want to live?

Category tags: Find Your Passion | Guest Post | Journey | Passion and Careers | Why People Don't Pursue their Passion