Every moment is a moment of your life. You are never in practice – This Is It! There’s no time to prepare. Therefore every choice you make has power.

“We can’t do this life thing halfheartedly. There’s no time off. There aren’t even weekends.”¹

Every choice is based upon what you value (consciously or otherwise), and these choices create your life, and what you contribute to life, in accordance with, and as an extension of, those values. Have you consciously assessed what your values are? Do they reflect and embody the qualities of the person you’d like to be? Do the choices you make therefore, lead you towards that person, or do they lead you away?

From a spiritual perspective, let us consider Heart Based Values… every choice is either aligned to them, or is not. If, in every moment, we choose Heart Based Ways, our life will be impeccable – that is, aligned to the Higher or Best Part of ourselves. In any moment we choose ways Not of the Heart, we demonstrate un-love. This just reveals we value something other than Love – and we are allowing these other values to direct our life, at least in that moment. If indeed we strive to be a being of Love, the occasional moment of minor deviance from the Heart, will not drastically alter our River of Love; but if choosing non-Heart Based Ways is a habit, we can divert our River away from the Heart and Love altogether!

Our life is a manifestation of our choices, a direct reflection of what we truly value – both the objects and the ethics – the what our life is filled with and the how we got it.

While it is true we can’t do life halfheartedly (for we are living it, whether we engage consciously or not) – we can easily do life half Heartedly, or even heartlessly, without Heart at all – if the values that inform our choices are not themselves Heart Based! If you value Heart Based Values, choose them, in every moment. Commit to your Heart, and live by the Heart.

If we make our life’s choices halfheartedly, i.e. without conscious awareness, we are still making choices. But in this manner, we are allowing the currents of our lower nature (our line of least resistance), of society, of those intent on manipulating and controlling us, to inform and direct our choices!

Some may say, but surely there are exceptions, that some do life halfheartedly… What about the procrastinator?

Firstly, I would remind you, you can’t half live life, you are quite definitely alive and therefore living, or you are in fact dead. So let us be clear, Procrastination, as it is commonly understood, doesn’t exist!

Allow me to explain…

It is commonly thought that procrastinating is not choosing, that it is delaying a choice, delaying taking action (living halfheartedly) – but it most certainly is choosing. Procrastination is the choice – to take the action of ruminating, of mental emotional circling, the choice to tell yourself a story: “Once I have…, then I will…”. The running of this story is the person’s choice – for this too is an action.

It is not a useful choice, but it is a choice none-the-same. The story and circling is their choice!

This story however, is based upon a false notion, that “I can do it later” (for whatever reason), but there is only the moment, Here Now – this is where your power exists.

So let us accept that we are alive, and recognise therefore that we are choosing in every moment. Let us decide to consciously evaluate our values and be sure the ones we hold and act upon, are the ones that represent who we want to be. My suggestion is to embrace living wholeheartedly, consciously engaged and aware – and to choose to live whole Heartedly, choosing every moment as the moment to choose Love (capital L) and choose Heart Based Values and Ways!!

In Love and Heart
Jocah

1 The Daily Stoic by Ryan Holiday. Pg 265. Bold added by author.