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Guest post by: Karen Parsons Become an Author

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that she literally hadn’t taken the time to smell the roses.

After working with thousands of high-level professionals, believe me, I see the same pattern over and over again. People achieve their dreams and goals, believing that attainment will bring them the fulfillment we all intrinsically long for –only to come to the uncomfortable realization that they aren’t as happy as they had expected to be. Usually it happens somewhere between 37–55 years old. They begin to ask themselves questions like, “Isn’t there more to life than this?” “Is this it?”

I, too, was forced to ask myself those same questions many times over. In my prior career as a highly successful search consultant, I was one of those people with so many goals, so many aspirations and dreams, that I was always going a hundred miles an hour. Endless to-do lists filled my purse; endless thoughts raced around in my head. I was too busy, too wound up, too stressed! Even though I’d achieved my goals and built a thriving business, I wasn’t thriving. I was very fortunate to have so many blessings in my life, and of course I knew this– but there was always this underlying restlessness. I could never truly be present and deeply enjoy the moment; I always felt like I should be more or do more.

This type of mentality is a recipe for those deep regrets you hear about when people are on their deathbed, wishing they’d lived life differently – wishing they had stopped to smell the roses.

Now, it may seem a bit ironic that I’m a personal and business excellence coach, teaching professionals how to be the best they can be and fulfill their highest potential. One of the key differences I had to learn through many life lessons, though, is that fulfilling your maximum potential and being all you’re meant to be isn’t really about getting anywhere. It’s not about becoming anything. It is about learning how to love life NOW. This doesn’t mean you don’t work on bettering yourself or your life. It doesn’t mean you don’t want to better others’ lives. Rather, it’s developing the awareness to enjoy the ride along the journey of life – how to be truly fulfilled and happy along the way.

One of the greatest ways I know how to do this is through gratitude. I mentioned earlier that ‘I had so many blessings in my life and of course I knew that’, but feelings of gratitude aren’t with most of us throughout the day. We all get frustrated by what is going wrong, instead of dwelling on what is going right.

So, if I can share one tool with you, here it is: practice an attitude of gratitude. I imagine you already know how important it is. But it’s been my experience that few of us know how to implement it into our lives, so much that it becomes our way of seeing our life – our way of being. We’re so interrupted by the endless mind chatter, the incessant to-do lists.

Living a life of gratitude is possible, but it does require a perspective shift. I’m so grateful that I’ve been able to help my clients make this shift, and now gratitude has become a fundamental part of their lives. They find themselves greatly changed, more relaxed and attentive to what matters. I am excited to announce an opportunity for women leaders to experience this shift. “Take theStressful out of Successful!” ©A 12 week teleclass series designed for women leaders in business to learn how to reduce stress and maximize success in all areas of life!

Below I have shared with you something that was written that helps us to put how fortunate we are in perspective.

_____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

As The World Turns

“If we could shrink the earth’s population to a village and the village had 100 people in it, with all the existed human ratios remaining the same, here is what the village will look like:

57 of those people would be Asians

21 of them would be European

40 would be from the Western hemisphere, both North & South

8 would be Africans

52 of those people would be female

48 would be male

70 of them would be non-white and 30 would be white

70 would be non-Christian and 30 would be Christian

89 would be heterosexual; 11 would be homosexual

6 people would possess the entire world’s wealth, and all 6 of them would be from the United States!

80 people would live in substandard housing

70 would be unable to read

50 would suffer from malnutrition

One would be near death and one would be near birth

One and only one would have a college education

One and only one would own a computer

When you consider our world from such a compressed perspective, the need for acceptance, understanding, and gratitude becomes glaringly apparent. Therefore,

If you have food in the refrigerator, cloths on your back, a roof over head, and a place to sleep,you are richer than 75% of the world. Doesn’t that call for some gratitude?

If you woke up this morning with more health than illness,you are more blessed than a million who will not survive this week, because of illness.

If you have money in your bank, any money in the bank, or even in your wallet, and a spare change in a dish some place in your life,you are among the top 8% of the world’s wealthy.

If you can attend a church meeting without fear; fear of arrest, torture, or death,you are more blessed than 3 billion people in the world.

If you have never experienced the danger of battle, the loneliness of imprisonment, or the agony of torture, or the pains of starvation,you are ahead of 500 million people in the world.

If your parents are still alive, or still married, you are very rare.

So, if you have the opportunity to think as you choose to think, to worship as you choose to worship, and you have a little bit of change in your pocket, and you’ve got your health, and you’ve got someone who cares about you, then you have a lot to be grateful for. Treasure our divinity by being in a constant state of appreciation, looking for occasions to be joyful, to be happy, and to be in the state of gratitude.”

Although I can’t locate the author’s name, I did conduct some research on this topic. There are people who dispute the statistics and have listed their research. Interestingly, even their research only came up with slightly different statistics in most cases. The bottom line is that there is still a huge disparity in the world, and if you’re able to read this, then you are among one of the most fortunate minorities in the world.

What do you think? Do you have a lesson learned, a story, or some wise advice to give others on how to stop and smell the roses?

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