The following is a guest post by Bill Bruner, a father of three girls who loves the outdoors and believes in helping people and organizations in any way he can. A tax accountant for the past 11 years, Bill was previously a professional actor doing regional theater and radio/TV ads. I am grateful to Bill for taking the time to put together such an encouraging and thoughtful post.
I hope you will enjoy it.
If you would like to be a guest poster on my blog, please contact me.
I was one of those kids, you know the kind, the ones you love to hate. I’ve been very bright for as long as I can remember. My parents tell me by the time I was 3 or 4 I could recite all of the dinosaurs names and tell you by their picture or plastic replica which one was which.
My mother said by the time I was 5, I could sell ice to an Eskimo if they would give me five minutes.
I was always the best in my class and often the best in the school. I played all sports and was involved with cub/boy scouts, church (including being an altar boy) and several other after school and community events/groups. I was called the “all-American boy” and was told that I could do anything I wanted with my life.
The sky was the limit.
The truth was I had a problem and as I grew older that problem consumed me.
The problem was that because I was so bright, I was always right!
I knew the answers to anything that was ever asked of me. I could figure out ways to do things better than anyone else. I know you think this sounds great but what happened was that I got stuck in my head.
Every decision in my life had to analyzed and thought out over and over again. I would wake up in the middle of the night with questions running through my head. I was consumed by the need to know more than anyone else.
Now, I’m not here to tell you that being bright was bad.
No. In many ways it’s still great to be able to figure things out and look at things quicker and differently than anyone else. (Besides, Heidi loves the fact that I can figure discounts in my head or total the groceries within a couple of dollars without using a calculator.)
But you lose so much when you need to be right all the time.
I have learned that one of the biggest obstacles in life, and especially to love, is this need to be right.
When we allow ourselves to be wrong, or to simply listen to others, the world opens up to us.
The decision to be able to make mistakes and to listen to other points of views, even if you don’t agree with them, allows your mind to expand and, most important, it allows you to connect with your true self (soul).
I was hampered for many years in my life by this need to be right and the total takeover of my mind over my spirit.
The journey for me became even more difficult because in order to get away from thinking, I looked at doing more and more creative things.
I gave up my dream of being a veterinarian and focused entirely on being a professional actor.
I became fairly successful at this craft and made a decent living for many years. The problem was that although the creative lookout help quiet my overactive mind, the EGO became a big issue.
As I’ve mentioned before in my blog, I didn’t have the best relationship with my Dad and so intrinsically I never felt I was good enough, even though many times I was the best.
This feeling of not being good enough fueled the EGO even more and so I moved from being consumed by my head to being a slave to my EGO.
Neither of these extremes are a good way to live.
I thought I had a good life, I had my three girls and several good jobs but I realized that I had no idea who I really was. I quickly figured out that the extremes in my life left me with no real connection to my soul.
I felt lost but as many of us do I just continued to cruise along.
I had periods when things went incredibly well and times when things went terribly bad.
I never really marked time other then my daughters’ birthdays or, on occasion, another important event.
Finally, I decided to start to understand who I was and what life was really all about.
Slowly over time my life began to change. This change wasn’t always easy because now I had to confront the depths of the struggles I hid away in my life and never dealt with.
I slowly began to live the life I always dreamed of. Things weren’t always perfect but life was good and, more important, I began to love who I was becoming.
The things I write about in my blog “Journey to Joy” are the things that changed my life and I hope, through my writing and encouragement, that you’ll be able to find the life you should be leading.
I believe we are all destined to live a joyful life and it is only through our struggles with our EGO and our head that we don’t lead the life we can.
Let go of the need to be right, allow yourself to make mistakes, and forgive yourself for the mistakes you make.
Let go of the EGO. Learn to live with it but understand that it can never be satisfied and it’s always the loudest and quickest answer to any question.
Reconnect with your true self, find love for who you are, and share that love with the world.
I hope you’ll all come by my blog and join the journey to joy.
Hugs,
Bill.
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Hey Mansi, Awesome Initiative. And Bill, You are good, somebody who can accept that he/she was wrong at some instant, is truly a big person. Loved reading your experiences, and surely i learned a lot. Thanks for sharing and Mansi keep inviting new people. Cheers.
Thanks Rahul for your kind comments as well. We all make mistakes whether we want to admit it or not. The challenge is to accept that we’re not perfect & therefore to own the mistakes we make & learn from each one. If we close our mind off to the possibility that we’re wrong we blindly go forward without the opportunity to learn & grow from the mistakes we make, when this happens we are forever stuck in an EGO based pattern that will never enrich our lives…..the EGO can never be satisfied.
Hugs,
Bill
"I have learned that one of the biggest obstacles in life, and especially to love, is this need to be right."
These lines struck a chord within me. Though I might not be as bright as Bill, somewhere I was/am obsessed with being right and this arises out of the fact that many times I am right.
Thanks for writing Bill and Mansi, for allowing Bill to write here.
Joy always,
Susan
Thanks Susan for the comments & for stopping by my blog, I appreciate it. It’s a difficult path to let go of the need to be right especially if you are often. The key to me was understanding that even if others ideas weren’t the best (in my mind) they were other possibilities & by opening my mind opening my mind to their ideas together we could come up with an even better idea then I had thought of. The need to be right is very much EGO based as the EGO needs to know it’s the best…move beyond the EGO to your true self & it will become easier.
Hugs,
Bill
Thanks for the opportunity to share with your readers some of my ideas.
Hugs,
Bill
Thanks Bill for a great post. And thanks to Mansi for inviting him for being a guest blogger.
I completely agree with the thoughts put forth by Bill.
“Letting Go” is one of the most important thing to learn.
All of this will defined help us to live a more enriching and fulfilling life.
Vyankatesh, Thank you for your kind comments. “Letting go” is difficult because the EGO believes it can control everything when in reality we can control very little in our life. To me the only things we can truly control is our reactions to others & ourself. I wrote a blog several months ago about control I hope you’ll check it out.
Hugs,
Bill
Thank you, all, for your encouragement. I knew Bill’s post would be very well-received and I am glad that you took the time to not only read his pearls of wisdom, but also visited his blog. I hope to bring other writers to my site as well from time to time, so you may benefit from their insights.