3 Tips For a Contented Life

I’ve experienced about a half-century of life. In my guises as a writer and artist, I’ve also been a keen observer of how others have lived their lives. With the perspective that only time provides, I offer up three of the keys to getting through it all.

1. Be Mindful of Your Debts

I’m not just talking financial debts here, but social ones as well. While it’s clear that asking a favor of the Corleone family isn’t going to reduce your stress level, there are many other exchanges we make that can start the tummy-rumblings within us. I’m not saying not to make these exchanges–they are necessary for anyone who isn’t a hermit–but to be mindful of them. The exchanging of favors needs consideration of the costs involved. Short-term gain is rarely worth the long-time stress.

Still, there are also financial debts to look out for. Like most, I had my bout with the plastic and the sometimes loan-shark-humbling interest rates. I eventually paid my way out. Once I was relieved of that burden, I can’t tell you how liberating it was. Having held at least some financial debt for all of my adult life, I hadn’t fully realized how much freedom you have when the debt is gone. So, everything I have is now paid for. If/when money is a issue, I have options. I’m not going to say it’s no-stress, but it’s a lot less.

2. Share Love

This one should be easy, but it’s often fumbled. Love isn’t a quid pro quo arrangement. It isn’t a debt–in some ways it’s the opposite of debt. If someone loves you and you don’t love them, you have no obligation to love them back…though you do have a social contract to be nice. (Obsessive and criminal behavior isn’t love, so no need to be nice when it is at that point.)

Love is very much one of those things that “You know it when you feel it.” It’s emotional. It’s often demonstrative. When it’s mutual, it’s wonderful. Sometimes, when it isn’t reciprocated, it’s painful.

The only caution I give is that you need to have your eyes wide open. Abuse is never love. When the specter of abuse (emotional or physical) rises–run. Run fast. Find help. And when you are able, find better. Find someone else, find something else (pet, garden, cause, etc.), to share your love with. The alternative is to be indifferent to everything, to let the love you hold die inside of you. Who needs that?

3. Own Your Choices

Every action we take is a choice. Wake up or sleep in? Go to work or get fired? Snort a line or walk away? Star Trek or Star Wars? We are constantly making choices. The key for being okay with that is to own your choices.

Many people have bits of their lives they’d like to reset. If only I hadn’t slept with Suzy. If only I had slept with Suzy. If only I…. More often than not, that just seems to fuel discontent. While it’s good to examine your past experiences and choices, speculating on the outcomes had you chosen differently doesn’t seem to help people’s frame of mind–most people thinking things would have turned out better than they perceive their current situation to be. What’s important is that you accept responsibility for those choices you’ve made. The sum of their consequences has been what has formed you.

That’s not to say you can’t make new choices. Staying with your current circumstance or doing something to try and change it is also a choice. It’s a choice you can make now. Just own it. It’s yours. Take responsibility for the life you are making for yourself. It gives you power.