I spent sleepless nights imagining something catastrophic would happen, like losing my job, and I wouldn’t be able to afford a mortgage.Īfter a while, I realized I was creating fake-problems so I could fake-solve them so I would feel better about my decision to rent an apartment. While that reasoning made all the sense in the world to me, I still couldn’t move forward. The logical side of my brain kept saying, “You pay rent every single month to someone else so he can pay his mortgage, why don’t you just pay your own mortgage instead?” For the past year, I’d gone back and forth on this BIG DECISION. Recently, I was in the process of buying a house. And that’s when our ideas about what’s real and what’s true can get in the way of living our best life. And this usually works out OK for us when we’re happily hum-drumming along the path we’re “supposed” to follow.īut when we feel the itch to step outside of our normal routine in order to pursue a dream down a road we’ve never traveled, fear tends to kick in. In essence, we create our own realities and believe them as truths. When I say that “perception is reality”, I simply mean reality is a brand new, empty coloring book, and we color the pages with our biases, personal journeys, and even our fears. Your reality is just your perception of your reality. Our realities are just like those paintings-they are created by our unique set of beliefs and experiences. How can they possibly be so different? The answer, of course, is that different experiences and interpretations lead to different outcomes.īecause “paint the water blue” means a crystal-clear baby blue where you can see your toes in the sand to you, but it means a slightly greener tint to someone who grew up around colder, seaweed-filled oceans. The waves are bigger in one, the water is a little on the green side in another, and someone added a few birds to that one over there… but you all received the same instructions from the same teacher at the same time.

You look around the room and notice every single sunset is slightly different. You spend an hour on your painting when you get up to grab another drink. It’s paint night, and you’re immersing yourself in the experience of following an instructor as she helps everyone create a simple painting of a beachy sunset. Picture this: You’re seated at an artist’s table with a few friends by your side. If you asked three different people to describe the same event, they would tell three different stories.īeing ready for a change means first being aware of your personal reality. But reality isn’t the same as undisputed truth. We often make the mistake of thinking reality is something that’s black and white-an incontestable fact. If you’re ready for a change, making small shifts in your everyday life (and how you think about your everyday life!) will make all the difference.

Tiny decisions