2012 Resolution #25: Grow
Posted on January 30, 2012 by Maria McInnis, One of Thousands of Life Coaches on Noomii.
#25 in our series today about how important it is to grow as a person
Resolve to grow as a person.
Yesterday we talked about trying new things to expand your world, but today I’d like to focus on allowing yourself to grow in more than just your skills or your possessions.
“You’re not your job. You’re not how much money you have in the bank. You’re not the car you drive. You’re not the contents of your wallet.” – Chuck Palahniuk
I once had a person come in who was so afraid to change that it was affecting his very life: he was afraid for a chance to gain a promotion from his work, and to move into a better and yet cheaper place to live, and needed to be freed from this chain that had weighed him down to the point he was paralyzed in his current lifestyle, even though he was being offered positive change.
I explained to him that what he needed to do then was to grow instead of change. “You want to do the best you can, and have the best you can, don’t you?” I asked him.
“Of course I do!” he replied adamantly. He then went on to explain how much he really wanted everything that he had just told me he was afraid to have. “I just don’t like change,” he said finally after going through the list a second time now, aware of the contradiction he had just presented me.
“Then, instead of changing, grow,” I told him, “An acorn becomes an oak, but it’s always the acorn. It just becomes something more than how it started. I’m not asking you to be an acorn that becomes a pine, I’m asking you to use what you have, what you have gained and become more than you are now. Your desire, and the world, agrees, so why should that mean that you need to change. It’s because of who you are that they want you.”
Change will always happen irregardless of if we do anything or not. By growing you choose new ways to move through the world around you, and if change does happen, at least you are more prepared to meet it.
The oak tree can stand against the storm that the acorn drowns in, and it becomes useful to the world around it: providing homes, food and oxygen for the rest to thrive off of. If you grow, like the oak you will have more to offer to the world, while also seeing more of it as you grow.
Wonder must lead us, along with curiosity and courage. That is why this year you must resolve to grow, by allowing yourself to have an open mind, open eyes and an openness to learn from all that is offered to you along the way.
