“Time is the most valuable thing a man can spend.” -Theophrastus

There are certain things I don’t want to do that I sometimes feel I should.

Case in point: A lot of people who run blogs similar to Tiny Buddha eventually begin coaching, running seminars, and offering eCourses on personal development.

Many of them email me with opportunities for partnerships. I respect and admire them. They’re insightful, well-intentioned individuals who are sharing what they’ve learned to make a difference and make a living.

But the reality is I have no interest in following their lead. I run this site because it fulfills me; and while I appreciate that it helps sustain me, I simply don’t want to spend any of my time teaching, coaching, or running self-help programs.

I’m happiest when I spend my time writing and engaging in creative pursuits. This is what I know is right for me. Regardless of how much money I can earn by partnering with other people in the personal growth sphere, I know beyond the shadow of a doubt it’s not something I want to do.

The only question that remains is: How willing am I to honor that knowledge?

This, I’ve found, is where things can get complicated. It can be tempting to lose focus of what we actually want if we compare ourselves to other people, or start shifting our attention away from the activities we enjoy toward the income we could generate doing something else.

The irony, however, is that money is not what makes our time feel valuable. It’s the sense that we’re doing what we want to do in the way we want to do it.

That being said, money is necessary to live, and sometimes we need to take on work we don’t love to make ends meet or get from A to B.

But once we’re in a place of enough, we’re faced with two options: base our choices on what earns the most; or based them on what feels valuable to us individually. This will be different for everyone, meaning we truly need to own our choices and resist the urge to compete or compare.

My genuinely happy place might look like your comfort zone; your fully content might look like my inauthentic.

These are our hours to fill. Only we know what makes them feel valuable—and only we can do something about it.

Photo here

“Your belief determines your action and your action determines your results, but first you have to believe.” -Mark Victor Hansen

In my early 20s, I got involved with a pyramid scheme that I mistook for an ethical company.

I didn’t realize it at first, but most people were only pretending to make money because they believed they eventually would.

Since the revenue came mostly from attracting new recruits, the head of my young team had rented out an office suite, largely to establish a sense of credibility. This made it look less like a risky network marketing business, and more like a lucrative career path. Of course, I didn’t realize this at the time. I wanted to believe, so I did.

On one of my first days after joining, right before a scheduled presentation with 30 potential recruits, we got kicked out of our office because of a dispute with the rent.

In that moment, I had this vision of our entire 40+ person team setting up shop in the tiny Starbucks downstairs. I grabbed all the marketing materials and overflowed with earnest enthusiasm as I told everyone, “We don’t need an office. We just need to bring our heads and our hearts!”

In the movies, this kind of thing always seems to work. Things fall apart, and yet they somehow come together simply because people care, they’re determined, and they find a way.

I learned from this scenario that we need to be discerning about what we choose to believe, and clear about why we care. But, I also realized that it isn’t naive to believe we can create miracles when we recognize our passion is our greatest asset.

In most situations, it’s not smoke and mirrors that create the magic—it truly is the people who believe in it and as a result never consider giving up on it. People run the companies. People create the brands. People change the world.

People just like you and me. It’s not a fancy office that does it. It’s not a massive paycheck. It’s not even the best laid business plans.

When it comes to building anything worthwhile, it starts with a willingness to believe in ourselves, each other, and what we can create when we have good intentions and keep going.

Photo by Scottfeldstein

“If you concentrate on what you don’t have, you will never, ever have enough.” -Oprah Winfrey

When I’m not working on Tiny Buddha, I write for ‘tween girls, both as a contributor for a magazine and a ghost writer for a website.

Recently, I wrote several blog posts about the holiday season. One girl commented that she was excited to have received a $50 gift card and a few clothing items.

Everything changed for her when she read that another girl received a $500 gift card and an iPad, among other presents. Suddenly her gifts seemed completely inadequate.

While there’s a lesson in here about our consumer culture, and its effects on our children (the collective “our” since I don’t even have pets, let alone kids), this got me thinking about the comparison game we often play as adults.

It can be challenging to identify what we believe is enough and then feel satisfied with that if we consistently weigh our choices against other people’s.

In my book, I referenced some research that reveals we often adjust our spending based on the earners just above us, whether we can afford to or not. When the rich get richer and buy bigger houses, the earners just below them feel the need to go bigger—and this cascades down the economic ladder.

We end up with a lot of people buying houses farther away from work to get more value for their dollar, commuting longer hours, borrowing more, saving less, and spending beyond their means—which ultimately can decrease our overall life satisfaction. It’s largely because of that instinct to “keep up with the Jonses.” Not doing so can feel like defeat.

But is it really? What does it mean to succeed—to fill a life with things based on what other people think they need, or to fill our time with experiences based on what we truly want?

I’m not going to suggest we stop comparing ourselves to other people, because I prefer to work with human nature than against it. But maybe the trick is to be mindful of what we’re comparing, so it’s less about having the same things as people we imagine are happy, and more about making similar choices to people who truly are.

Those choices rarely have to do with anxiously chasing bigger and better in tomorrow, and everything to do with peacefully creating and appreciating enough today.

Photo by Mala Imports

“The use of money is all the advantage there is in having it.” –Benjamin Franklin

I just came back from the dentist where I learned I need $1,400 worth of dental work, and it’s largely because I failed to make a $100 investment last year.

My former dentist had informed me my teeth were worn down from me grinding them in my sleep. She’d suggested I purchase a customized mouth guard, which would run from $100–500, depending on the quality.

I decided to spend $30 at CVS instead, because I enjoy spending as little as possible and, as a result, I often finds ways to cut corners. It’s not because I don’t have money; it’s just because I prefer saving it.

Ultimately, wearing this ill-fitting mouth guard turned out to be an expensive decision, because it kept my mouth slightly open, which dried it out each night—and saliva is something that prevents tooth decay and protects us from cavities, of which I now have eight.

Have you ever decided to go with the lowest cost contractor—maybe for work on your house or your website—only to find you got what you paid for?

Have you ever opted to go without health insurance because you assumed you wouldn’t need it, only to find that health is fragile?

Have you ever bought the cheapest possible furniture, only to realize spending just a little more would have made a big difference in your enjoyment of your space?

Or how about this: Have you ever talked yourself out of a dream because it would require a financial risk?

These are all things I have done—sometimes to save a little, and other times to save a lot.

It seems contrary to conventional wisdom to suggest that not spending can be an emotional decision, but it can be exactly that—a choice to skimp on something necessary or useful in fear there won’t be enough down the road.

This scarcity mindset can prevent us from rationally weighing the options when a moderate expense now can prevent a major one later—or even make us money in the long run.

If you’re someone who spends freely without fear, this lesson may not resonate with you, but for those who can relate: less is not always more.

Sometimes we need to invest in ourselves or our future. As long as we’re not spending recklessly, we can trust this truly is the wisest choice.

Photo by sherrattsam

“Kites rise highest against the wind, not with it.” –Winston Churchill

Have you ever purposely chosen to do something you felt resistant to doing? I do this occasionally because I recognize I sometimes limit myself by being inflexible.

I can be a creature of habit, particularly when it comes to situations that make me feel in control.

For example, I have one specific spot where I like to sit when I work in the Starbucks near my apartment. It’s right by the window and sufficiently removed from the chaos of the line.

It’s the best lit spot, and it’s both private and ideal for people-watching, since I can see the entire room and the passersby outside. When this seat is taken, I sometimes feel hesitant to stay.

Yet I consistently make myself sit and work wherever there is open space, despite my instinct to leave, because this is a mini test in acceptance—and there are many areas of my life where my controlling instinct affects far more than where I work.

Every time I simply sit wherever there’s space, instead of indulging black and white thinking, I release my rigid grip on the ideal and get better at accepting and making the best of what’s in front of me.

Not everyone deals with my control issues, but we all have areas where we limit ourselves in life.

Maybe you avoid certain situations if you think you’ll have to wait because you know you get impatient. Or maybe you steer clear of events where you’d meet new people because you know you’ll feel vulnerable or awkward.

If you don’t feel the desire to improve in these areas of your life, then by all means do what you always do. But if a part of you wants to feel less limited, you can likely find abundant opportunities to practice doing things differently.

Life presents us with countless mini tests if we’re willing to take them. Each one is an opportunity to let go of the way we usually react and embrace a new way of being.

Today I challenge my instinct to be rigid and controlling. What test will you accept today?

Photo by Ton Haex

“Always concentrate on how far you’ve come, rather than how far you have left to go.” -Unknown

Though I write a lot about mindfulness, focusing on here and now, there’s something empowering about looking back and realizing how far we’ve come. I’m not just talking about our big accomplishments. I’m referring to the many tiny personal victories we often achieve without taking time to honor them.

The other day, after I arrived at my local coffee shop to work, my computer died. No battery, no power from the cord, no explanation—and no backed up files.

I have an entire unpublished book in my saved documents. Forget for a minute how foolish it was to not have saved this somewhere else. (I know!)

What mattered to me in that moment was that I did not freak out. I did not catastrophize as if it were a person I love who died, not just a computer. I didn’t need someone else to drive me to Office Max so I could have a panic attack in the passenger seat. At one point, I would have.

Once upon a time, when anything went wrong, I fell apart.

Responding calmly, for me, is a huge victory. So I decided to stop and celebrate that, to rejoice in how far I’ve come.

Life is always going to entail challenges, both expected and unforeseen. We can choose to measure our progress based on the circumstances we’ve improved—the benchmarks, the goals, the professional successes. There’s nothing wrong with recognizing the big external changes we’ve created.

But we can also celebrate our many personal successes—those times when we respond better and more wisely to a difficult situation than we would have years ago—and in doing so increase our odds of finding a solution.

My computer wasn’t completely dead. It turns out the battery and the cord both need to be replaced. There was a solution, but I was prepared to accept and deal if there wasn’t one, instead of getting down on myself.

So today I honor how far I’ve come in maintaining my composure when things go wrong. In what area of your life have you made significant progress, and have you taken time recently to celebrate it?

Photo by Jan Kromer

“Try not to become a man of success but rather a man of value.” –Albert Einstein

As I was getting my coffee the other morning, I thought about this article I once read on a popular news site about a man who lost his big corporate job and accepted a barista position at Starbucks.

When he decided to don a green apron, he’d lost everything in life—including his marriage, his livelihood, and his health. Through his experience in the hospitality industry, he gained a sense of humility and peace, away from the hectic world of professional ambition.

When I read this article, I remember thinking it was interesting that, as a society, we’re fascinated with people who fall from grace and then learn to love a simpler life—and yet we don’t generally attribute the same awe to people who choose that from the get-go.

I know many people who’ve chosen to work as waiters and retail sales associates, only to find themselves the recipients of well-intentioned advice from friends who think they should aim higher in life.

From a very young age, we’re taught to reach for the stars and believe in our potential—and to be careful not to become complacent underachievers.

We learn that ambition is a sign of self-confidence, competence, and intelligence, and the ultimate indicator of success in life. We also learn to associate a lack of ambition with laziness, aimlessness, and indolence.

A lifelong blue collar worker, my father once told me that drive is not a measure of worth, and that we all have a right to honor our different temperaments and preferences.

I had never thought of it this way. I assumed that if I consciously chose to do less, it would mean that I was thinking small, selling myself short, or generally hiding behind fear.

But maybe he was onto something. We each have the same number of hours in the day to fill—and we have a right to decide what might make them feel valuable and meaningful to us individually. The money and attention those activities generate only dictate our success if we define it that way.

There’s nothing wrong with wanting to achieve and strive in life. But happiness is generally a byproduct of doing what we genuinely want to do, not what we think we should do based on what we’ve been told.

Photo by pearlbear

“A man’s errors are his portals of discovery.” -James Joyce

When you were little, did you ever rip up a picture you’d worked really hard on just because you colored a little out of the lines?

I was that girl; and I had a similar experience this weekend.

I decided to make lasagna for this potluck party my boyfriend and I were going to host. I don’t cook often, so this felt like a big deal. I got all the ingredients the night before, stacked them on the counter, and then admired them. They were the pieces of my saucy masterpiece to be.

The next day, I realized I’d made several mistakes, including buying the wrong type of noodles and failing to buy a bowl large enough for the massive cheese concoction.

Since oven-ready lasagna noodles don’t break easily, I went through an entire box trying to perfectly fill in all the gaps in the pan. When my lasagna ended up looking like the food equivalent of Charlie Brown’s sad Christmas tree, I seriously considered tossing it out, even though there wasn’t time to buy ingredients for another.

I decided instead to push through my perfectionist instincts because this has been a pattern in my life: start something and quit if I think I’ve messed it up.

Last week I wrote about the beauty of starting over, but as with everything in life, it’s not universally applicable. Sometimes we need to start fresh, but sometimes we need to keep going, through the messiness and imperfection. I haven’t always done this well.

When I’ve made huge mistakes with friends, I’ve wanted to hide or bail. When I’ve messed up royally with jobs, I’ve wanted to call in sick or quit.

It can feel vulnerable to be present in a situation where you feel you’re struggling or not showing yourself in the best light, but this is how we grow: by stretching ourselves through discomfort instead of shutting down.

This is how we get closer to others, closer to our dreams, and closer to the people who we want to be. It’s how we learn about ourselves and identify areas for improvement.

Things are going to feel messy and imperfect lots of times in life. We can either resist that and run whenever things feel out of control, or lean into the mistakes and learn from every one.

Photo by renaissanechambara

“Beware the barrenness of a busy life.” -Socrates

If there’s one thing I’ve learned from writing, it’s that knowing what to remove is often just as important as knowing what to add.

Surprisingly, it sometimes take just as much time to write something short as it does to write something long because it entails rewriting and editing to capture the most important points with the most specific words.

I’ve found that this same idea applies to other things in life: sometimes creating peace, happiness, or satisfaction has everything to do with what we choose to take away.

You can love the work you do, but if you overextend yourself, even the greatest passion can start to feel stressful and overwhelming.

You can adore your significant other, but if you spend all your time together, you’ll likely start to appreciate your relationship less and wonder what else there is.

You can value your spiritual practice, but if your life becomes all about contemplation and self-reflection, you may start to feel somewhat removed from other people and the physical world.

There are definitely times when need to do more; but sometimes the best thing we can do is scale back on what we’re already doing, create a better sense of balance and space to just be, and then see how we feel.

Last year, a writer named Allison Miller contributed a blog post about an aerial acrobatics accident that put her out of commission for months. A friend of hers suggested that this was a gift. Though she initially resisted this idea, she ultimately realized she previously stayed busy to mask her loneliness, insecurity, and emotional pain.

It was only when she couldn’t do anything that she realized what she wanted to do, and what she didn’t want to do anymore.

I’m not suggesting we should all take a hiatus from our lives, a la Eat, Pray, Love; I’m proposing that sometimes the answer has nothing to do with more and everything to do with less.

When Michelangelo finished sculpting the David, many people asked him how he created this masterful work of art. His response: “It’s simple. I took away everything that wasn’t the David.”

Our lives can be our masterpieces if we can learn to chisel away at the thoughts and choices that don’t contribute to our sense of authenticity and balance.

Photo by geishaboy500

“Of course there is no formula for success except, perhaps, an unconditional acceptance of life and what it brings.” –Arthur Rubinstein

Can ambition and wisdom coexist? Can you simultaneously want something specific and drive yourself to create it while accepting that what will be, will be?

The other day, a reader emailed asking this question—if he can motivate his team at work to “do whatever it takes” to reach their goals, and also teach them to embrace the idea of surrendering.

At first glance, these two ideas seem conflicting. Implicit in the suggestion to “do whatever it takes” is the idea that there is a way—it’s just a matter of finding it. Surrendering, on the other hand, implies an understanding that the future is uncertain and not entirely within our control

So what does it mean to persevere, and believe fully in your vision, while knowing that there are no guarantees? How can you motivate yourself to keep plowing ahead toward a specific goal, while also detaching from the outcome?

If you surrender to the unknown, will you lose that sense of urgency—that drive, that hunger that propels you toward your dreams?

A teacher once told me that successful people act as if they can’t fail—that the outcome they want to create is a given, so all they need to go is keep going until they find their way through the maze of obstacles between now and then.

I understood his intention. If we believe we can’t fail, we won’t doubt ourselves or lose confidence when we inevitably stumble.

But this teaches us to ignore our instincts when they tell us we no longer want to do something; or that it would be smartest to cut our losses and do something else. The reality is that there will be times when it’s wisest to change directions or give up.

Surrendering is recognizing that this is always a possibility—and then being open to the signs that tell us when to persist and when to change course.

Ambition without wisdom is inflexibly attaching to a specific goal, even if it means making foolish decisions that conflict with your values, beliefs, intentions, and instincts.

Wise ambition is the knowledge that you can still “succeed” and be happy, even if you need to change your goal or adjust your action steps.

Photo by parhessiastes