Heading back to the car after lunch, a good-looking guy with a
swagger caught my attention. Or rather his t-shirt did!
Emblazoned across his back were the words, ‘I create the havoc
that keeps me from my destiny.’ These words have a touch of
irony about them. I think we might all be aware of times when
we’ve “got in our own way.” And never one to miss an opportunity
for growth, I ended up asking myself a question: Where am I
creating havoc havoc in my own life and what is it costing me? I
beleive that everything crops up in our life at just the right
moment. You see what you need to see; hear what you need to
hear; feel what you need to feel, so you can come closer to who
you really are. Is this a new concept for you? If this is a new
concept just take a moment and consider something that cropped
up for you over the last week and think about who you were being
at that moment. If you experienced true, heart-felt joy and
happiness we can conclude you were being close to the true
essence of you in that moment. On the other hand: If you felt
frustration, disappointment, anxiety or anger then maybe you
were some distance away from who you really are. If this is the
case you may like to give further consideration to who you are,
so that in moments of difficulty in the future you can be closer
to your truth. But I bet you’re wondering what chaos I’ve been
creating! Because I love writing I do lots of it. Sometimes too
much. As I write this article, I have edited parts of a one
hundred and twenty thousand word manuscript on my desk. Notes on
a personal development book, by my side, and details of the
eight articles I’ll write by next Friday. And that’s not all…
Of course there are my children to consider and a relationship
to nurture; fun to have, friends to be with. But at the time I
saw the guy with the T-shirt I entered a phase of my life when
things suddenly got muddled. I got involved in too much. I
lacked balance and then guess what happened? I put my back out.
Isn’t it wonderful how your body does this kind of thing? Just
when you’re feeling under pressure something pops and then
suddenly you can hardly do anything. And of course I wasn’t
deterred! I found a way to work around the pain: hot-water
bottles, a footstool to take the pressure off my spine and
massage, and I was back in business. That was when something
else happened. That’s right, the hard-drive on my computer
crashed. The computer took a few days to resolve. And I admit
there have been times in life when I might have got angry at
this point. But this time I didn’t – maybe because a distraction
occurred. A blinding headache, with stabbing pains. At this
point I said, ‘I’m giving in. I take the hint. But what might a
back-ache, a computer crashing and head-aches have to do with
creating havoc? My back relates to movement and balance. When it
locks up, it is like a vice – I can’t move forward, back, left
or right. The computer crashing caused a temporary pause in my
work, but not long enough, so the headache came along to force
me to take time out from my head, close my eyes and recharge
etc. So how can this kind of information be used in the future?
Maybe, in the future, when I get backache, I listen to my body
and stop long enough to get life back in balance. Perhaps then I
won’t need to put up with a computer crash or the headache. And
looking back a few weeks I can now see the importance of taking
the break. This issue has made me consider: what is most
important when you’re faced with a situation that creates havoc?
The answer, I believe, is gratitude. Everything enters your life
for a reason. See it as an opportunity to grow. Come to love it.
Come to understand it, and you will find it enters and leaves
your life more like a ripple than a storm. Embrace the havoc! It
has a message for you about who you are. Jo Ball & Neil Millar