Various Rules for Thought
In this section I’ve gathered sets of “rules” that might be helpful in looking at or approaching your life. As with all “Rules” circumstances may change thereby requiring changes in these rules. Because the only rule I know that is permanent is the rule of impermanence.
The button below each set of rules will open and download a PDF file of those rules.
Rules for Living
No one owes you anything — not the government, your employer, your family, or your spouse. Although the world around you is less and less definite and predictable, it is no less valuable and mysterious. To rejoice in living, you must invent your own future, entrepreneur your life, and expect surprises.
Global change is the primary force in your life, and in the lives of everyone on earth. We are all in training for a new era for all humanity. Don't whine about it. Take advantage of the expanding possibilities now available to you in our world of constant flow.
You have no ultimate safety, security, or guarantees, so don't expect any. What you have are endless opportunities to rearrange your priorities for work, play, and life. Choose wisely and expect more choices to follow.
Your life is an adventure, a journey through time. There are no lasting arrival points and few lasting endings. Everything is flow — you just keep moving, day-by-day, and week-by-week following your internal compass for adventuring through the long haul of ninety years or more. You live on a boat in a river, flowing in white water from the alleged reference points of yesterday to the utter unknown of tomorrow. Learn how to say "hello" and "good-bye" with grace and style.
Know how to recycle yourself. Live each chapter of your life fully, then invest in a transition and begin the next one. Weave, unravel, and reweave your life, over and over. No matter what your age or situation, design your future as your manifest destiny.
The most honest way to guide your life through these infinite changes is to follow your own values and vision. Like a rudder, your values will keep you on a course your integrity prefers. Like a sail, your vision will pull you ahead towards legitimate results.
Your best future happens when you have the courage to: reach, learn, risk, dare, and leap. Embrace the unknown ahead. Live on the outer edge of your possibilities, not on the inner edge of your security. Be active, not passive. Lean into the wind.
Here is how to conduct your journey: Have a long-term purpose with short-term goals. Be definite and flexible. Trust the ocean but stay in charge of your boat. Ride the waves.
Refuse to be defined and consumed by your career work. It's an integral part of the whole journey, but it's not the journey itself. Your most deep-seated agenda is your soul's work, your holistic callings to create success and caring in all the parts of your life.
Everyone on earth is linked to the same destiny. We share the same air, water, food, and capacities for total destruction. We are in each other's hands, one for all and all for one. Interdependence is our truth.
Learn how to grow older and better. Achieve mastery as a human being —- model wholeness, wisdom, and caring. Rewrite the myths of aging with your evolving presence and leadership. Be grateful. Leave a legacy that makes a difference.
Acceptance to “what is” provides a key and path to your own freedom. Only by accepting “what is” will the steps of what could begin to unfold before you with clarity. Acceptance, like forgiving, does not mean condoning.
As you find better rules — and you will — replace these rules with them.
Rules for Being Human
Gratitude to
- Dan Millman: “Way of the Peaceful Warrior” -
YOU WILL RECEIVE A BODY.
You may like it or hate it, and it will be yours for the entire period this time around.
YOU WILL LEARN LESSONS.
You are enrolled in a full-time informal school called life. Each day in this school you will have the opportunity to learn lessons. You may like the lessons or find them irrelevant and stupid.
THERE ARE NO MISTAKES, ONLY LESSONS.
Growth is a process of trial and error, like an experiment. The “failed” experiments are as much a part of the process as the experiment that ultimately “works.”
A LESSON IS REPEATED UNTIL IT IS LEARNED.
A lesson will be repeated to you in various forms until you have learned it. When you have learned it, you can go on to the next lesson.
LEARNING LESSONS DOES NOT END.
There is no part of life that does not contain lessons. If you are alive, there are lessons to be learned.
“THERE” IS NO BETTER THAN “HERE.”
When your “there” has become a “here” you will simply obtain another “there” that will, again, look better than “here”.
OTHERS ARE MERELY MIRRORS OF YOU.
You cannot love or hate something about another person unless it reflects to you something you love or hate about yourself.
WHAT YOU MAKE OF YOUR LIFE IS UP TO YOU.
You have all the tools and resources you need. What you do with them is up to you. The choice is yours.
YOUR ANSWERS LIE INSIDE YOU.
The answer to life’s questions lie inside you — all you need to do is look, listen, and trust.
FROM TIME TO TIME YOU MAY FORGET ALL OF THIS.