Today, I want to share with you an article written by our beloved Morgana BraveRaven. Morgana is back from the offline world and will be actively writing and working with success seekers and I thought I'd break you in with one of her earlier articles.
This article was originally printed in 2001 and is applicable today.
Thanks for reading,
Janet
The Joy of Struggling
..... struggle is effort laced with emotion and desperation.
…Stuart Wilde
I think that we will all agree that to succeed at anything we are going to have to put forth a little effort. That said, I think a smidge of clarification is required:
Effort and struggle are not one and the same.
Effort should never be married to its foul nemesis struggle – the result is disaster. These two make poor bedfellows, and we should do our best to ensure that they never mingle in any of our endeavours.
Effort is necessary. Struggle simply perpetuates more struggles. Effort takes you somewhere – struggle takes up your time and energy. Effort paves your path – struggle clutters your road. Effort is efficient – struggle, as Stuart Wilde puts it, is an unholy battle that you fight with yourself.
So how can you tell if you are perpetuating struggle in your life? Here are a couple of clues: Do you work really, really, really hard to achieve success, and despite your effort, do you never seem to get any closer to achieving your goals? Do close friends and family sit back and shake their heads while they watch you buzz around like a crazed hornet? Do they ask you what the heck you are working so hard for, since nothing in your life seems to change in any way? Maybe you can hear your own little inner voice asking the very same question.
If any of the above sounds familiar to you, then you may be stuck on the struggler’s path. At this very moment you may be experiencing the Joy of Struggling.
What? You’re not enjoying it?
It’s not a pleasant experience?
You’re right. There is no joy in struggle. It is not fun in any way, and it is not productive. How would I know?
Ladies and Gentlemen, it is with a bashful blush that I confess to you that I have in the past dabbled in the art of struggle.
Yes, it is true. By chance I came to realize that I had a problem. I was tidying up my desk one afternoon when I found a little book that a friend had given to me. The book was Life Was Never Meant To Be a Struggle by Stuart Wilde (gee, I wonder what that friend was trying to tell me). I sat down and started to thumb through the first chapter. As I was reading one of the struggler profiles a nagging little voice in my head piped up in a very sarcastic tone and said, Hey cupcake, kinda sounds a bit like you… dun’it?
This the profile that struck a cord:
If I bust a gut and hurtle around trying hard, people will see me as a good [person] and they will treat me with respect. Whether I get results or not matters little, as long as I am seen to be making a valiant effort. To make sure everyone acknowledges my heroism I will create an entire theatre of frantic action, hectic schedules, meeting of earth-shattering importance, long hours and constant pressure. Of course this pantomime will make me a bit tense but that is all part of the act, for the tension will be seen my others as my taking responsibility and they will love me and respect me for that…
When I finished reading the passage that nagging little voice chirped in again, Yup, that’s you alright, that’s you. Juggling chainsaws.
Oy. It was true. I was juggling chainsaws and the problem with that act is that when you drop one, it kicks back and bites ya. My life at that point was consuming me. My life was living me. I was much to far out…and not waving but drowning.
Now it is normal to struggle from time to time. It’s human, but to struggle all of the time is a real problem. Stuart Wilde claims that struggle is a programmed response. Many of us struggle without even being aware that we are doing so – certainly I fell into that category.
So how do you deal with the plight of the struggler? As always, the solution is simple.
First you have to fess up. Identify the problem. Are you perpetuating struggle in your life? Come on, be honest.
If you checked the yes, as a matter of fact I am a struggler box, read on, if not, email this article to someone you know who is a struggle-o-maniac and then go make yourself a cheese sandwich. Take the night off. You are dismissed.
The only way you are going to reduce the struggle in you life is to admit that you are stuck on the struggle-o-matic cycle. Struggle is a slippery slope that will only ever deliver your effort into the muck. Struggle is not productive – effort is productive.
You do not need to struggle to be successful. Flowers do not struggle to bloom – they just bloom. Children do not struggle to grow – they just grow. The moon does not struggle to rise – it just rises.
Nature does not struggle.
You are a part of nature and you do not need to struggle.
The next thing you will have to do is eliminate struggle from you life.
To eliminate struggle you are going to have to do a little digging and evaluating. Consider all the aspects of your life: friends, family, leisure, work, business, body, mind, spirit, and any others that comes to mind. Are you struggling in any area? If you are then you are out of balance. Struggle is really a little gift sent to remind you that you are out of balance, and that something needs to shift.
I highly recommend these two books to help you off the struggle-o-matic cycle.
"Life Was Never Meant To Be A Struggle" by Stuart Wilde (a wee little book that may be difficult to find, but well worth the effort to locate a copy), and The "Seven Spiritual Laws of Success" by Deepak Chopra (a very popular book available at most book vendors and libraries. If you only intended to read one book in your lifetime The Seven Spiritual Laws would, in my opinion, have to be it). These two books were instrumental in helping me unhinge myself from my attachment to struggle, and I just can’t say enough about them. They would be a bargain at triple the price on the cover.
Struggle is not natural, nor is it pleasant or productive. You cannot struggle your way towards success. If you insist on struggling (and yes, this too is a choice) then you will only ever amount to a successful struggler. Is that what you want?
Way you go then. Go do your reading. Take good notes. Do a little digging in your life. If you find that you believe, as I did, that you have to struggle like the dickens to be successful … well, you may want to take a change of mind into consideration. A changed mind can change a life.
Are you really hooked on The Joys of Struggling, or would you rather approach success with effortless ease? Your call.
Morgana Braveraven
Visit Morgana Here
About the author – Residing on Beautiful Vancouver Island, British Columbia, Canada, Morgana BraveRaven shares her most excellent gift with each of us. Her success is based on helping others get what they want, and focusing on the needs and desires of her clients to help them achieve. Morgana writes exclusively for SykaroInsightsTM. Visit Morgana Here
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