Wisdom-Trek / Creating a Legacy

Welcome to Day 598 of our Wisdom-Trek, and thank you for joining me.

This is Guthrie Chamberlain, Your Guide to Wisdom

Enjoy Life Today

Thank you for joining us for our 5 days per week wisdom and legacy building podcast. This is Day 598 of our trek, and today is Philosophy Friday. Every Friday we will ponder some of the basic truths and mysteries of life and how they can impact us in creating our living legacy. Currently, we are on an extended multi-week trek as we explore the teachings from some of my virtual mentors such as Jim Rohn, Zig Ziglar, and Earl Nightingale.

The core of our current trek is based primarily on Jim Rohn’s book called The Five Major Pieces to the Life Puzzle. I have learned a considerable amount from reading and re-reading this book on my own trek of life, and I trust that it will benefit you also. Keeping with the continuity of Wisdom-Trek, I have adapted it to The Five Trails on Life’s Trek.

We are broadcasting from our studio at The Big House in Marietta, Ohio. The weather has been somewhat cooler than normal for a spring day in May, but the additional rain that we have received will certainly allow everything to grow rapidly.

Our granddaughter Hazel continues to do well. She is on a strong dose of steroids in addition to her chemo, so she desires to eat often. And the steroids are making her swell up a bit. She is also starting to lose her flaming red hair that has come to symbolize her. Elizabeth did cut off her flowing curly locks of hair shortly after her diagnosis with leukemia, so she does have those preserved. It will be interesting to see if it grows back in the same color or some other color. The attending physician indicated that it may grow back both a different color and texture.

We continue to adjust to a schedule that is neither normal nor consistent, but realize that we have to live based on the axiom that I have repeated many times. We must deal with life as it is, and not what we hoped it to be. We must let go of the life that we have planned, so as to accept the life that God has planned for us.

As we continue today on our 5^th trail, which is the The Trail of Lifestyle, we will explore how to be happy and joyful with the lifestyle that we currently have while we strive for the lifestyle that we are creating.

If you have missed the past few Philosophy Friday treks, it would be good to go back and review them to get caught up on our progress so far. We have a lot of ground to cover today, so let’s break camp and begin the fifth trail of this extended trek as we cover…

The Five Trails on Life’s Trek – Lifestyle Part (4)

As a reminder, our overall extended trek covers these five trails:

1. Philosophy

2. Attitude

3. Activity

4. Results

5. Lifestyle

1. Enjoy Life Today While Preparing for a Better Life Tomorrow

Although you may not be able to control every situation that comes into your life, you can choose to design your own life of joy and happiness. You can choose to enjoy every experience of your lifestyle. You don’t have to wait for your life to get better to enjoy your lifestyle. If you choose not to enjoy life today, then waiting will merely prolong the agony of putting up with poor service, short tempers, ruined moments of joy, and a continuation of life as it has always been.

That beautiful feeling of joy, peace, and happiness can begin wherever and however you are because it has nothing to do with having more things, but how you view what you currently have.

Obtaining more material “things” isn’t the answer to happiness. If you can count your blessings on only two or three fingers, then putting diamonds on those same fingers isn’t going to give you more joy, peace, happiness or blessings. If you have failed to develop meaningful relationships and friendships when your resources are meager, then you aren’t going to be any better at finding or keeping good friends when your finances improve.

The experience of a meaningful relationship with someone who has been with you through the good times and the bad, who knows you and cares about you in a way that makes you feel good just to know that they are in this world, is something we cannot afford to postpone. None of us know when our work for God will cease on this earth, so it is imperative that you learn to enjoy your life and lifestyle today with what you currently have while you are working towards a lifestyle that you desire. As Jesus’s half-brother James tells us in his letter James 4:14, “How do you know what your life will be like tomorrow? Your life is like the morning fog—it’s here a little while, then it’s gone.”

There is as much joy in watching our children learn to ride on a secondhand bicycle as watching them wobble away on a new one. Are you going to deny them or yourself that incredible experience simply because you can’t afford the best or the most expensive toys right now?

Joy and happiness aren’t something you can withdraw from your bank account. It is something to withdraw from your life and from those around you. There is nothing wrong with wanting more for yourself and for your families. It doesn’t mean that you have to experience less of life’s true treasures because you have less or that you will appreciate them more when you have more. If you cannot learn to have joy and be happy with what you have right now, then you will never have joy or be happy no matter how much good fortune comes your way.

2. Wherever You Are, Be There

One of the major reasons why you may fail to find joy and happiness, or to create a unique lifestyle, is because you have not yet mastered the art of being present where you currently are.

While you are home, are your thoughts still absorbed with solving the challenges you face at the office or at work? When you are at the office, do you find yourself worrying about problems at home?

Do you go through the day without really listening to what others are saying to you? You may be hearing the words, but you aren’t absorbing the message.

As you go through the day, do you find yourself focusing on past experiences or future possibilities? Are you so involved in yesterday and tomorrow that you never even notice that today is slipping by?

There is certainly a place for learning from your past and planning for the future, but do you just plow through the day rather than harvesting something from the day. Are you everywhere at any given moment in time except living in that moment in time?

Lifestyle is learning to be wherever you are. It is developing a unique focus on the current moment and drawing from it all of the substance and wealth of experience and emotions that it has to offer. Lifestyle is taking the time to watch a sunset. Lifestyle is listening to silence. Lifestyle is capturing each moment so that it becomes a new part of what you are and of what you are in the process of becoming. Lifestyle is not something you do, it is something you experience. Until you learn to be present in the moment, you will never master the art of living well.

As the Apostle Paul reminds us in his letter Ephesians 5:15-17, “So be careful how you live. Don’t live like fools, but like those who are wise. Make the most of every opportunity in these evil days. Don’t act thoughtlessly, but understand what the Lord wants you to do.”

We are deliberately taking our trek slowly on The Five Trails on Life’s Trek as we continue our hike today on the Trail of Lifestyle. Today we learned that we must be happy with what we currently have while striving to obtain what we desire. We also learned that to enjoy life today, you must live in today.

Next Philosophy Friday we will finish on our fifth trail, the Trail of Lifestyle as we dig into the concept of letting life really touch us. So join us next Friday for these additional insights. I know you will find these insights interesting and profitable in living a rich and satisfying life.

Our next trek is on Monday, and we will continue our series called The Tools In Gramps’ Backpack where we equip you with the tools needed to impact the lives of others. So encourage your friends and family to join us, and then come along on Monday for another day of our Wisdom-Trek, Creating a Legacy.

That will finish our trek for today. If you would like to listen to any of the past daily treks or read the daily journal, they are available at Wisdom-Trek.com. You can also subscribe on iTunes and Google Play so that each day’s trek will be downloaded automatically.

Thank you for allowing me to be your guide, mentor, and most of all your friend as I serve you through the Wisdom-Trek podcast and journal.

As we take this trek of life together, let us always:

1. Live Abundantly (Fully)
2. Love Unconditionally
3. Listen Intentionally
4. Learn Continuously
5. Lend to others Generously
6. Lead with Integrity
7. Leave a Living Legacy Each Day

This is Guthrie Chamberlain reminding you to Keep Moving Forward, Enjoy Your Journey, and Create a Great Day Every Day! See you on Monday!