Yesterday I wrote something on how hard it is to be fearless, especially once you see how much we are actually influenced by fear.
A warrior lives from the heart. He doesn’t live from the heart sometimes, or only on Sundays, he lives from the heart unconditionally. Now pause at that word and let it sink in: un-conditionally. That means no exceptions. It means honoring the voice of your heart 100% of the times for the full 100%. It is not about meeting your heart halfway following your heart most of the time. It is about following your heart totally and completely for the rest of your life.
Everybody can do the right thing when the wrong thing is not that appealing in the first place. Most guys will help an old lady cross the street when their new girlfriend is watching. But when you are already late for a potentially lucrative business meeting and it is raining cats and dogs it becomes more difficult to find he decency to get that old hag to the other side of the street.
In your heart you know what is good. It takes courage and practice to do something that feels counter-intuitive to our selfish ego, aka the coward. It is pretty hard to follow your heart when the coward is screaming in your ears that you should not do it. Ever. And let me be clear, very few people ever arrive at that place, the place where the coward feels he has to scream. Most of us are comfortably ruled by the coward, he never has to raise his voice and there are no warriors in sight making his life difficult. Let me put it differently: if you don’t know what it feels like to have a terrified coward yelling at you every day he is the one steering your ship.
The 100 Day Warrior is carefully designed to bring out your hidden warrior. You get a taste of what it means to be capable of artfully conducting your life in every action, from drinking tea and doing the dishes to training your body and uplifting your job. But the coward is a tricky bastard and if we aren’t mindful he sneaks in and puts on some warrior clothes.
Being a warrior is connected with what we do right now, today, rather than with anything theoretical or waiting for a cue from somewhere else. The basic vision of warriorship is that there is goodness in everyone. We are all good in ourselves. As warriors we live as servants of that goodness.
That means that we do what is good today, even if it is inconvenient. It starts with showing up on your meditation cushion because meditation is the most effective way to confront your ego. If you don’t do your meditation or if you do it only half-assed you have already lost the battle against the coward. And that is just the start. Because if your meditation practice doesn’t translate to honorable behavior it has no value either. You make an effort in the morning to open your heart, next step is you obey it during the day.
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This is episode 36 in a series of 100 blog posts that will be published daily during the 100 Day Warrior, a unique program around physical strength, inner wisdom and meaning. All posts are written by Atalwin Pilon, founder of Basic Goodness and creator of the 100 Day Warrior. For requests for motivational speaking, in-company workshops, online coaching and mindfulness training click here. If you would like to join our international community of brave and inspiring human beings or just follow this blog and receive updates, please click here or sign up on the right side of the page. Atalwin specializes in coaching smart and creative people, both groups and individuals. If you are interested in a free coaching session click here.
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