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What a trip my life has been so far! I have experienced everything from complete bliss to utter hell...I have an idea about where I will end up (besides dead, like everyone else who has lived!) But about the journey....do we seek happiness and joy as the end result? Every time I reach that point-on the home team, winning 13-0, with only a half-inning to go, sitting on the bench, just thinking about the wonderful shower I am going to take-the visitors score 22 runs, and my journey goes on! In other words, I am beginning to see that it is the journey that is the point. What do you think? Jaianniah Stay tuned...I have my own answer for this one, which I will post in a few days. I have just posted my answer below...Jai 12/19/09 3:50 pm CST. |
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If you've come to the realization that the journey is the destination, then I think you've come to a significant turning point in your life. Here is my favorite poem, Ithaca...if you take the time to read it and ponder it, you might understand now why I like it so much.
So maybe you can see that the destination doesn't really matter at all. The only thing that matters is that you are heading somewhere. |
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Happiness and joy are not the end result but rather a way of being that we remember when we look within. There is no ultimate goal or destination on this spiritual path, although the ego likes to trick us into thinking otherwise. It is all about the journey and remembering who we really are, when we begin to do this we grow and expand in ways we could never imagine. There are both blissful and challenging experiences enroute and it is how we react to these that determines how our journey progresses - when we realize that it is our reaction to a situation, and not the situation itself, that affects how we feel, we then know that we do have free will and the choice is always ours. Our journey then becomes an adventure. |
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How can you go anywhere in a continuous moment of now? Because no matter where you are, there is where you are being. Alice in Wonder Land "No matter where I go, there I am!" Yes and those that know understand that on a far deeper level of existence as you just pointed out.
(21 Dec '09, 15:24)
Wade Casaldi
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From a Wallace Wattles kind of way, we could say we have goals and achieve them, but what happens next? It is on to the next goal, even billionaires (that could if they wanted to), -live below their means and not bother doing ANYTHING for the rest of their lives- seem to have to strive for the next thing! So it would seem that the goal once attained losses it's attractiveness, and how can you want what you have? You can only want what you do not yet have. The desire to have the thing is the drive, when asked what one thing lead to Arnold Schwarzenegger's success he said "DRIVE". Desiring and pursuing the object or goal wanted is exciting, and you know that once you get this thing you will be happy, and when you do get it -yes- you are elated and overjoyed, but that doesn't seem to last does it? After all how many days, weeks, even maybe months can you spend saying, "I made it, I have what I set out to get and I'm a winner!" Let's take my trophies for example: they sit on my dresser covered in stuff, "look what I once won years ago." doesn't seem to have the same flair as "look what I just won!". However it is still the same accomplishment the only thing changed is the time frame, other than that it is still the same in every way. From this we must deduce that the accomplishment was the end of the journey. What do we find at the end of the journey in life, the climb (that we all spend our lives climbing) up "boot hill" but a tomb stone with our names? So it seems we are most alive in the climb, we are most alive in the desire and pursuit of happiness than the fleeting achievement of happiness. The interesting thing is I can go into a deeply metaphysical approach and say this is not just "life" and would be a very fitting reason for reincarnation to exist. Imagine kids getting to a park or anyplace, they are excited to get there, "Woooooooohoooooooo this is the greatest, wow I am having so much fun!" then ten minutes goes by, "Is this all there is? I'm board, I want to go back home." I remember as children my parents took my brothers and I to see Niagara Falls. As children we weren't too impressed and were bored, my mom said we said, "is this is it?" Like "we came all this way just to see this?" I remember we liked the wax museum and Fort Mc-Henry more because it was a changing experience that had to be explored instead of just looked at all at once. Of course that only lasted until we were again bored and had seen everything. lol |
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As you have all pointed out in different ways, it is the JOURNEY that matters...we make short "destinations" for ourselves: to graduate from high school; to maybe finish college; to have a few kids,perhaps, and see what that's like; and so on. But are we really paying attention while we are questing for our goals? It is like going on an long road trip and never looking out the window, and observing the terrain as it goes by! Or going to high school, and not taking the time to appreciate our friends, our teachers, or the experience of learning---all these things are soooo important! I have had a feeling since I was a little girl that my life was not going to be a "long" one- I do not know why (I might live to be 99, like my Grandmother, who celebrates 100 this coming May 27th! Who knows?). This "feeling" made me really pay attention to the journey. Since I was a little girl, I have stopped always to "smell the flowers". When my children were born, I made a decision to stay home and raise them- despite the increasing pressure of society and my husband to go to work. It is simply because I did not want to miss ONE thing! Those were tough years, and they seemed long at the time, but I was there when they walked their first steps and spoke their first sentences. I tried to enjoy the he** out of them! I will never forget when we got Nintendo, and my son and I carefully mapped all the dungeons, and hated especially the Darknuts of "Zelda".(He sure did have a lot of sick days that winter!) (LOL!) Sure, we were poor, but we made do. I mentioned in another question that my family and I are estranged; they simply have never understood me at all! When there came a choice between chores and people, I chose the people. My house was never, and still is not, up to my mother's stringent standards. I never understood her passion for custom-made, lined drapes while her kids walked around in holey socks...I get my curtains at the Thrift Store. For her, material possessions are the journey and the point. That seems to work for her; it doesn't even interest me. I am no saint. I just want everyone to be sure that you all are noticing the passing of time.Make sure that you take the time to explore your passions, and just sit awhile and breathe, enjoying life. Life is the greatest Gift of God! Savor the heck out of it, and enjoy! For it all goes by in a blink of an eye. Blessings, and Merry Christmas 2009...Jai |
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We are ultimately going back to where we came from and that is our destination. However, when we get to our destination, we will have had a vast number of experiences on the journey which was the whole point of us wanting to come and live life on earth. We are all non-physical beings who are part of a bigger non-physical consciousness. We decided to project ourselves into this physical reality and when we die, we will merge back into the non-physical again. I like this analogy used by Abraham Hicks in some of their seminars:
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ITHACA As you set out to Ithaca hope the voyage is a long one, full of adventure, full of discovery, Laistrygonians and Cyclops, angry Poseidon-don't be afraid of them: you'll never find things like that on your way as long as you keep your thoughts raised high, as long as rare excitement stirs your spirit and your body. Laistrygonians and Cyclops, wild Poseidon-you won't encounter them unless you bring them along inside your soul, unless your soul sets them up in front of you. Hope the voyage is a long one. May there be many a summer morning when, with what pleasure, what joy, you come into harbours seen for the first time; may you stop at Phoenician trading stations to buy fine things, mother of pearl and coral, amber and ebony, sensual perfume of every kind- as many sensual perfumes as you can; and may you visit many Egyptian cities to gather stores of knowledge from their scholars. Keep Ithaca always on your mind. Arriving there is what you are destined for. But do not hurry the journey at all. Better if it lasts for years, so you are old by the time you reach the island, wealthy with all you have gained on the way, not expecting Ithaca to make you rich. Ithaca gave you the marvelous journey. Without her you would not have set out. She has nothing left to give you now. And if you find her poor, Ithaca wouldn't have fooled you. Wise as you have become, so full of experience, you will have understood what these Ithacas mean. Constantine P. Cavafy The whole point is the Journey. Make yours a good one. I am working on mine! Blessings, and thank you, for all your wisdom along the way as I go towards Ithaca. Jaianniah |
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the journey is more important then the target! experiance with no veil to cluster your sight!TIGER, tiger, burning bright In the forests of the night, When the stars threw down their spears, Tiger, tiger, burning bright |
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