I was recently having a conversation with two friends of mine, Sean and Joe. They both work for the same company. They both work crazy hours. But Sean has managed to live a full and complete life. He has a boat, has his pilot’s license, goes scuba diving, knows lots of people, has a girlfriend, and has an extremely active social life. Joe on the other hand spends most of his spare time watching television. Joe admitted that maybe he needed to apply some discipline and watch less TV. But he said that when he has tried to do that, he has not been successful. The problem is, discipline is not always the answer. Sometimes you need to find a passion that will pull you off of the sofa. Another friend of mine from the same company had a similar problem as Joe. She was busy with no social life. So she decided to take up horse riding. She quickly found that her life became fuller with more pleasurable activities, new social events, and a better outlook on life. She does need to make time for horse riding. Somehow there is always plenty of time for that, and for hanging out with the new friends she has made from her hobby.
In life, it is always difficult to stop a bad habit. I used to be a coke addict. Well, actually a Diet Coke addict. And every time I tried to stop drinking liters of cola a day, I would focus on it so much and want to drink more. Instead, I decided to let myself drink as much cola as I want, as long as I drink at least two liters of water a day. I now find I rarely drink much soda.
So although we may have convinced ourselves that we are busy, there are often huge opportunities to doing things we love to do even with a hectic schedule. It’s just a matter of taking the first step of finding something of interest, and then committing to doing it.