"Paradise" Is a State of Mind

As increasingly many Baby Boomers retire, a few are looking for that perfect place to spend the rest of their lives -- thinking that it is one place for all, rather than that perfect place that exists only in their mind.  Undoubtedly, a large part of it has to do with their external environment, but even more has to do with the place they have achieved internally on their own -- and that is a state of grace, and peace of mind.  That is the happy place.

Each gets there on their own unique path -- as a product of their own living -- and responses to the challenges of their own lives.  Those challenges are different for everyone -- and what they make of it.  And of course, there are many who get lost along the way, as well as the many more who have no clue -- about their meaning and purpose in life, but have allowed others to determine their fate for them.

But to an unprecedented degree and extent, we should realize that life is what we individually make of it -- from all the choices available to us, and not the only limited few we choose every day to repeat -- even to the well-proven disastrous results.  Those are because of our actions and decisions -- and not in spite of them, and those who can accept that realization and responsibilities, go on to achieve that greater state of mind and peace.  It is not just for another to give to everyone -- no matter how great and powerful.  The power is one's ability to give to themselves.

The first line of defense, is realizing the control others have on their own thinking and the desire to control another -- in the various ways of daily interactions that make the world seem greater -- or less.  Often, that power takes precedence over one's own ability to determine for themselves -- as what it must be for everyone, as though anyone had that right.

Maybe in another place and time -- in another era.  But now, increasingly, the lives we live are of our own choosing -- if we choose to make it so.  Many would rather not have those responsibilities and would rather others simply tell them what to think and how to live their lives.  Then of course, their choices will be made for and by the other's benefit -- and not necessarily for their own.  That can only best be served by making those choices for oneself -- as best they can determine.  So the best they can determine, is the best they can do -- and to choose otherwise, is to abdicate that responsibility to all the others.  Those results, will be less than ideal -- obviously.  Included in this, are all the addictions and compulsions people allow to take over their lives -- that spiral out of control -- to predictably disastrous and fatal results.

Where did they go so obviously wrong?  Less obvious, are the poor choices that take one's vitality slowly -- over the course of their lives, preventing them from reaching the best of their lives.  That is by far, the greatest loss of opportunity in the world today -- still.  People not making the best of their lives -- and then wondering, "What happened?"  They may live their whole lives in that denial.