Tenets, Principles, Beliefs on Living Life

July 9th, 2009 Posted in Personal

As I approach my 45th birthday, I am been reflecting on my current situation in life. Now, this post may be better suited for my 50th birthday, but since I have been thinking about it, I thought it made sense to document these thoughts now. Then, on my 50th birthday, I can see if these thoughts are the same.

INTEGRITY - I was once told the following: ” You can lose your Family, our Job, your Money, your House and your Friends through no fault of your own…….but only you can GIVE away your Integrity. It is the only thing in life in which you have TOTAL control so it must always be the most important value in your life and ALL decisions you make in life should be based on this tenant and/or principle.”

MONEY - Money is a means to an end. The only thing money offers in life is choice and opportunity. I was once told the following: ” Earning between 50K and 250K per year is the same. The only difference is that you live in a bigger house, eat at nicer restaurants, take fancier vacations, go to better schools and drive more expensive cars. Only after you earn more per year than 250K do you begin earning generational money which gives you more choices and opportunities for your family in the future”

KIDS – If you choose to have children and/or fortunate to raise children, this becomes the most important decision you can make in life. If you strip away culture and society, our biological purpose in life is to pro create and advance the human species. To achieve this goal, we are given the opportunity to learn what is “unconditional love”. It is an emotion which we are able to experience only when we raise children.

FAMILY – If one is blessed with having a positive family environment, it is a gift and not to be taken for granted. I was once told: “A family is one of the most cherished gifts provided in life, but to make it work, it requires constant effort, understanding and participation.”

WORK – We spend at least a third of our lives working. The key to work is not to work for money, but to decide how you want to spend your time working, take pride in that work and focus on being the best. When I was living in Tokyo, a visitor once told me they had never seen such a clean subway station and assumed the Japanese were very clean people. I looked down the platform and pointed to an elderly subway station manager. I then informed them that the reason the subway station is so clean is that the subway station manager takes pride in doing his job and to him, the subway station is his commitment to being the best he can be.

We are living in difficult times. Lives and relationships are being tested. These times however are a reflection of the choices we have made as a culture or society. For most individuals, their inaction is how they must shoulder the blame of our current situation. For other individuals, their actions and results of those actions are personal crosses they must bear.

For me to move forward however, I choose to focus on the tenets, principles that I have based my life. I can only hope that when I read this in 5 years, I will have stayed true to my tenets and/or principles and can feel good about how I have chosen to live my life.

Happy Birthday to Me