Go All The Way

A second short article on the path of Self-Mastery; if you missed it you can read the first here.

The second mistake people make is not going all the way. My take on what Shi Heng Yi means here is that this journey is very hard to persist, continue and maintain, and for several reasons.

There is no end

The journey is the destination, but our brains don’t find it easy to think in this way. We consider a journey to have a defined end, and so over time the drive and commitment can fade or be lost. It really helps to have a system of reflection and retrospection to help us keep on track and remind us of the reasons for staying committed and continuing on the path.

Life gets in the way

We regularly hit bumps in the road, and these can easily throw us off track. Use a combination of discipline and commitment, your desire to reach further states of Self-Mastery, and support from friends and mentors to keep you moving in the right direction, or to recommence your journey if you get stuck for a while. Pausing is ok too; you should take regular rests and enjoy the journey as you go!

The path is constantly evolving

As you progress on your journey, your path changes. A few years on the path may be significantly different to how you envisaged it a while back. Embrace this. If you knew how it would be back then, it wouldn’t have taken you this long to get here. Also imagine how great it might be further along the path.?

Keep going

So “going all the way” on a journey with no end becomes “keep going”. To do this, some rely heavily on themselves to reflect on progress, learn from the evolving journey and reinforce their commitment, others rely on other people close to them to help them progress, and some a combination of both. Do you rely on yourself or others, and if you find it difficult, could you increase the self-commitment, connect with other people for mutual support, or more of both??

Allow yourself to take pauses when you need to and accept that progress isn’t at a linear speed or in a constant direction. You may feel you’ve slipped back sometimes. Treat yourself with compassion and this as a learning moment. Maybe the learning from this will help you move forward in a future step.?

Enjoy the journey. This is one of hundreds of billions of planets in trillions of galaxies, and the chances of us being born are infinitesimal. Many people do not even start their journey of Self-Mastery, let alone get to the stage you are at already.?

Congratulations on making this far! Support your fellow travellers on the path and enjoy the journey as you experience it.

If you found this useful, go to my profile and click the bell ?? to ‘All’.

This content by James Carter is licensed under CC BY 4.0