What’s a decision then, really? Does making a decision also enable you to steer by it differently from the past? We all know otherwise. A decision usually first appears as a bright idea at the end of some long chain of thoughts or some observation. Its only difference is that it has a strong bit of inclination from your logic: after then, it’s just resting there. In order for it to become “real”, a reason strong enough to modify and turn your course of life, it needs some serious momentum-building proof around it. An example in legal parlance: making a point aloud doesn’t move the argument anywhere until convincing evidence is produced. Our minds need evidence to begin favoring a decision and create a “sustain” flag around it, most often in the first few days post decision.

Sometimes it’s possible that life puts you in a state or moment of time where a decision and the force for sustaining both arrive together. Such life-turning moments – mostly of shock-and-awe – have been key to remarkable life transformations in history. Gandhi, Teresa are examples that pop up immediately. However, most of our personal experience does not fall under the category of such flash reinforcement: we need an organic nurturing of a decision to strengthen it. Like you choose to grow a tree, you choose to grow key decisions in life.

Little acts can go a long way in building roots around decisions: Leo’s post on 4-line change making explains beautifully how you plant a change, nurture it and raise it to commit yourself to life-turning decisions. Robin Sharma goes a bit even further: he simply creates a flat rule of 21-days repetition for any new activity to be wired as a new default habit.

Once a decision reaches a state of conviction, the mind simply turns around it – you’re a different person now. You don’t need to argue inside your head with reversing decisions that threaten to rollback your efforts. You’d have crossed a gate through which a reversal is going to take, er, a new decision!

‘You are capable of explaining everything you feel. Why don’t you go to the Emperor and talk to him?’

‘The Emperor himself makes beautiful speeches,’ said Confucius, ‘but beautiful speeches are merely a question of technique, they do not of themselves contain Virtue.’

‘Well, send him your book of poems, then.’

‘Those three hundred poems could be summed up in two words: think correctly. That is the secret.’

‘What does thinking correctly involve?’

‘It’s knowing how to use mind and heart, discipline and emotion. When we want something, life will guide us there, but by unexpected paths. We often feel confused because we are surprised by those paths and think we must be going in the wrong direction. That is why I said, allow yourself to be carried away by emotion, but have enough discipline to follow it through.’

‘Is that what you do?’

‘When I was fifteen, I began to learn. When I was thirty, I knew what I wanted. When I was forty, my doubts resurfaced. When I was fifty, I discovered that Heaven has a plan for me and for each man on the face of the Earth. When I was sixty, I understood that plan and found the serenity to follow it. Now that I’m seventy, I can listen to my heart, but without letting it distract me from the path.’

‘So what makes you different from other men who have also accepted the will of Heaven?’

‘I try to share it with you. And anyone wanting to discuss an ancient truth with a new generation has to use his capacity to teach. That is my one quality, being a good teacher.’

‘And what is a good teacher?’

‘Someone who questions everything he teaches. Old ideas cannot enslave a man, because they change and take on new forms. So let us use the philosophical riches of the past, but without forgetting the challenges that the present world sets before us.’

‘And what is a good student?’

‘Someone who listens to what I say, but adapts my teachings to his life and never follows them blindly. Someone who looks not just for employment, but for a job that brings him dignity. Someone who does not seek to be noticed, but to do something notable.’

http://paulocoelhoblog.com/downloads/Stories%20for%20Parents,%20Children%20and%20Grandchildren

Surrender acts the key here. When you begin the day and end the day with an unmistakable, ecstatic cheer – looking forward to the next day, having not-so-lavish plans just in case you actually make through the next day (what?!) – irrespective of what happens in between during the day, you’re actually delegating the responsibility of pushing your day to a higher existential power; there isn’t anything you’d actually interpret as painful, everything’s just going to be a situation. In short, there’s no pain when everything’s the high will and not my will. A tiny bit of doubt is as good as total doubt here – it’s either 0% or 100%.

Such unconditional surrender leads to an exorbitant faith in the possibilities. If the Subject of faith appears all-powerful, this power is actually derived from the power and quality of the faith itself. That’s how God himself derives power – it’s the reflection of the quality of the faith the devotee places upon a selected form factor of the omnipresent existential force. In power, what others call miracles may become ordinary events. History tells us that powerful people are none other than ordinary people with a powerful faith in what they believed to be their vision.

I don’t know how many people really connected to Rajan, but it I’ve learned not to really be result conscious long ago :). In three words, Just do it.

What left me thinking was not the issue with indicator, but my absolute dependency on “indications”. I needed to know how much more I can go with my bike, I needed to know how much money is left in my bank, I needed to know how many person days are left in my project’s budget, I needed to track so many things. But for indicators, my life would surely be miserable.

Hey, do I have indicators for the real meaningful aspects of my life? How do I measure how much I’ve progressed towards my next position at work? How do I measure how much I’ve improved in my emotional intelligence? How do I measure how well I’ve learned to react to situations appropriately with instinct? How do I rate how well I talk and connect to my friends? When do I know if I’m ready to mentor a child? How do I measure how far I can go on before feeling the urge to retire?

Guess the real things in life aren’t friendly to numbers and scales.

Sometimes, it just feels right to stop doing whatever we’ve been doing, and observe the surrounding with a careful eye for lessons. That’s what I was doing.

Time keeps moving ahead, and if I were to delay penning the notes I’ve been gathering for a while, it might all just turn out worthless.

I hope not to take a break this long ever from writing, for I see this wires my intellect to my practice.