“Life is what happens while we are busy worrying about all the things we have to change and all the things we have to accomplish. Slow down, pay attention, and try to enjoy this moment. This moment. is your life.” ~Lori Deschene
Do you live your life in constant pursuit, in pursuit of happiness, freedom, comfort, or success? What do you do when what you’re desperately looking for isn’t at the finish line? What if it’s not a race? These were questions I asked myself a while ago.
I won’t lie. Answering them won’t completely change my life overnight. When I realized what I’m about to tell you, I didn’t make much progress, but it was a starting point.
The starting point was the realization that I had spent most of my life waiting. Chasing what you thought you were lacking.
In my pursuit of happiness, I was waiting for that moment when all my dreams would come true and finally bring me eternal joy.
In my quest to be a free spirit like the wind, I create mental cages and rules that keep me stuck and hopeless, unable to spread my wings even though I know the liberating feeling of flying. I felt stuck and hopeless, like a bird who can’t do anything.
In our pursuit of comfort, the potential for growth slips through our fingers.
In my quest for success, I forgot to pay attention to what really needed to be paid attention to: my health, my relationships, and my own brilliance.
What’s the big problem?
Chasing something means pushing it far away from you. The distance between what you want and what you believe you are missing is widening.
But what you want is already in your hands.
I didn’t have to wait for happiness because it wasn’t a destination to reach. Achieving goals and realizing dreams could not have made me any happier if I wasn’t ready to fully embrace happiness in the here and now.
Happiness was already within and around me. I just didn’t see it.
The freedom I so desperately sought would never have come to me if I hadn’t removed the mental blocks I had created myself. If I hadn’t first destroyed the walls my mind had built.
I quickly realized that comfort was not my friend. It just wanted to keep me safe and not necessarily make me feel alive.
In my pursuit of success, I kept running, running, running, like a hamster on a wheel, without actually going anywhere.
If life isn’t a race, then why are we always running?
We jump from one goal to another, from one person’s arm to another, from one dream to another. We are always running, chasing something that ends up becoming nothing.
If you take a moment to slow down and hit the brake pedal, you’ll quickly realize that chasing is making you unhappy.
It pushes everything we ever wanted away from us, within our sight but out of our reach.
How can you stop chasing the next big thing when you’ve spent your entire life pursuing something, anything?
what you want is already within you
The big change you have to make is to change your perspective on what you want.
I wanted freedom, but I couldn’t feel free because I had set rules in my life that I couldn’t break. At that time, I thought: If you are not even free in your own mind, how can you expect to experience freedom in other areas of your life (career, money, etc.)?
If you want love, connection, happiness, or purpose, are you sure it’s not you who’s standing in your way?
If you want love and connection, do you love yourself and are genuinely interested in others?
If you want to be happier, why not fill your days with little things that bring you more happiness?
If you want purpose, are you actively seeking out and engaging in activities that bring you a greater sense of purpose?
Change your perspective and start believing that everything you are looking for is already within you. Because it is.
live here now
Being more mindful means learning where your feet are. By embracing the here and now, you can put an end to what feels like a never-ending race.
Because if we learn not to have expectations or hopes for the future, the race cannot exist.
This moment is here, right now. nothing else matters. Nothing else really exists.
If this moment is true and all there is, it means that what you are chasing is already in your hands.
Being more mindful means giving yourself space to be still, to freeze, to stand, to be.
Mindfulness is not an end state, but a way of life.
You don’t have to meditate for an hour every day to become more mindful.
In addition to meditation, there are other practices you can incorporate to incorporate mindfulness into your day.
For example, you can start by changing the way you do everyday tasks.
It can be as simple as sipping your coffee slowly and taking in its warmth and flavor, rather than gulping it down.
Or you can listen to what your friend has to say instead of thinking about how you would react.
Or, instead of falling into the trap of multitasking, why not start doing one thing at a time?
If your body is here, why put your mind elsewhere?
celebrate the journey
Finally, if you want to stop chasing the next goal, state of mind, or fleeting desire, you need to realize how far you’ve come before you start looking ahead.
Instead of giving yourself time to reflect on your progress, why not slow down?
Celebrate your accomplishments, both big and small. Before you start looking for the next finish line, give yourself credit for the path you’ve taken. Your results deserve recognition.
What’s the purpose of setting big goals and milestones to achieve, but once you get there, you don’t even allow yourself to feel it to enjoy the experience?
A pursuit loses meaning if it is not celebrated.
What’s the point of reaching the top of a mountain if you keep looking for the next hike instead of enjoying the view from the top?
No matter how much you chase everything, or chase anything, you won’t get what you want until you start giving to yourself. Reflect on what you are pursuing and ask yourself, “How can I embrace it in the here and now?”
Stop wandering through life in endless pursuit of what is already within you. If you just start looking…
About Giada Crepaldi
Giada Crepaldi is a writer and blogger from a small town in Italy. Passionate about personal growth, she launched Purposeful Dreamers in March 2023 to inspire people to achieve their goals and create the life of their dreams. When she’s not writing, she can be found reading, traveling, meditating, and sharing inspirational content on her Pinterest and Instagram accounts.
