I have said a lot on this newsletter about how to use mindfulness to better define your goals and to limit your work as much as possible to tasks that help you make progress. I would like to provide some information about the other side of the equation. While it’s critical to ensure that we’re working smart, making progress on our spiritual journey also requires hard work.
Fortunately, there is a feedback loop whereby our efforts at introspection and spiritual progress enable us to work not only smarter but also harder. When we have a clear understanding of our priorities, we will be more energized to work towards them then if we are not sure what we want out of life.
It’s also important that we don’t get trapped into common pitfalls such as assuming that at a certain age we’re too old to learn anything new or to work towards a worthy goal. We are never too young or too old to work towards our spiritual goals because they transcend this mundane existence. Furthermore, we should not allow what we perceive as our past mistakes get in the way of what we know needs to be done. Instead, we can bring an end to our unfortunate past simply by bringing the mind into the present moment.
Speaking of the present moment, it is the observance of this phenomena that will give us the power we need to continually work harder. We should identify when we have a negative state of mind that is perpetuating the idea that we do not want or need to improve. This is a kind of lazy delusion that we need to carefully avoid. Once we identify these hindrances, it will not be long before we are well on our way to improvements in both our spiritual and material lives.