Wisely stated by Albert Einstein, which can be
generalized to: Learn from the Past,
Live in the Present, and Hope for the Future.
If you do each of these, you will be much happier.
LEARN FROM YESTERDAY
We should, indeed, learn from the past –
particularly from the mistakes we have made in the past. We certainly don’t want to make the same
mistakes again. But we also don’t want
to spend a lot of time thinking about these mistakes; they’re over and done,
and there’s nothing we can do about them except learn from them. So don’t continue to rehash the, and don’t
become obsessed with them. If you do,
they could become a source of frustration, and they could make you fearful of
failure in the future. In short, they
could make you very insecure, and this is of course, something you don’t
want. So learn from them.
It is, of course, okay to think about the past
occasionally, savoring some of the joys you had experienced, but you should
return to the present as quickly as possible.
Don’t develop nostalgia for the past.
This is a common fault with many people; they daydream about how happy there
past life was, and how dull and humdrum their present life is. Maybe your past life was better in some
respects, but too many people magnify the happiness of their past life and
forget about the struggles and sorrows they experienced. If your present life appears to be dull
compared to your past life, it’s up to you to make it better.
Don’t keep longing for the past. Today is much more important. It’s the present – what’s happening now – and
you should make the most of it.
LIVE FOR TODAY
Enjoy the day you’re living in. Wake up in the morning with confidence, and a
feeling that the day is going to be the best you have ever experienced. One of the best ways to do this is to relax
and live each day as if it were your last.
Dale Carnegie encourages everyone to live in
“Day-tight compartments.” And it’s the
best advice anyone could give you. As he
says, “Half the beds in our hospitals are reserved for patients with nervous
and mental troubles, patients who have collapsed under the crushing burden of
accumulated yesterdays and fearful tomorrows.
Yet a vast majority of these people would be walking the streets today,
leading happy, useful lives, if they had heeded the words… “Live in day-tight
compartments”.
In other words:
Shut off the past. Shut off the
future. Live for today! This doesn’t mean you shouldn’t prepare for
the future; it means you should not have any anxiety about the future. If you fret and worry about the future
continuously you could end up in the nuthouse.
So live one day at a time. Think of each new day as a new adventure – a
new life. Tell yourself that it’s going
to be the best day of your life. One of
the major tragedies of many people’s life is that they keep putting things off. In particular, they put life itself off. They’re always telling themselves that life
will be better – after they marry, when they retire, and so on. And as they wait, life passes, and suddenly
they discover that it has left them behind.
They have forgotten or perhaps never learned how to enjoy life, or maybe
they’ve been too busy and haven’t had enough time. Life is in the living, and it’s important to
learn this. “Today is our most important
possession. Don’t throw it away. Cherish it.
Live it. Enjoy it!”
Our happiness and peace of mind are determined,
to a large degree, in how efficiently we shut out yesterday and tomorrow. Most of your thinking should therefore be
directed at what you will be doing between now and when you go to bed.
Happy people don’t allow past failures and
problems, or worries about the future, to plague them day after day. If you do, you will likely end up depressed,
anxious and frustrated, and that’s no way to live. Remember that today is the most important day
of your life. So when you begin drifting
into the past or future, bring yourself back to the present as quickly as
possible.
HOPE FOR TOMORROW
It’s not that the future is unimportant. It is, and you should prepare for it. Prepare for it, but don’t be anxious about
it, and don’t worry needlessly about it.
Life is full of problems related to the future: financial problems,
worries over your health, worries about getting old. Some of these will come to pass (such as
growing old), but many of them will remain nothing more than worries.
So force yourself to remain optimistic about
the future, and the best way to do this is to foster hope. Never lose hope; hope encourages you to set
goals and strive to accomplish them. It
makes you optimistic and gives you faith in the future; it’s the thing that
spurs you on. It makes you dream of
better things, and it makes you feel good.
Anxiety on the other hand, depresses and
frustrates you. And it can easily get
out of control. Anxiety feeds on anxiety
– it’s a vicious circle. So get rid of
it as quickly as possible, and the way to do this is to fight against all
negative feelings and negative thoughts related to the future. Don’t be fearful of the future – look forward
to it.
Article courtesy of Dr. Barry R. Parker.
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