You hear me talk a lot about men living their life on their terms. This throws a lot of people off simply because they don’t understand what I mean by living your life on your terms. Many men assume that it means that you just steamroll anybody that gets in your way. You don’t regard anybody’s feelings. It is the epitome of hedonistic living. This is the farthest from the truth
When I talk about a man living his life on his terms, what I mean is follow his passion and follow what he is called to do. There are so many people in society who talk about how you don’t need to follow your dreams. Even Dave Ramsey recently on his show was talking about how it is OK if you want to follow your passion with a hobby but not with your employment.
I get that it is something that is out of the ordinary. You are dropping the preconceived notion that you have to go do work that you hate doing. You detest the hours of useless meetings that do nothing to help the company’s bottom line, nor does it benefit you. There are people who do some pretty wild things and it defies what we see as logic. Yet they are happy and going on adventures. How are these people living such a great life and you are following the dictates of society and still you are miserable?
That is what I want to address in this post. You living your life on your terms.
What Are Your Terms?
Now as I look for other people who may have different views from me, I like that there are hidden gems all around the internet. I found a great quote from the people over at Life on Your Own Terms and they said, “Life on your own terms means the ability to live a life that is meaningful and fulfilling to you”
The key to this is, to you. This could mean anything. Each person has their own set of thoughts around each of their own circumstances and so that person’s terms of living could be anything. Many times people choose that their terms are to be miserable. They believe that their life is meant to be a disappointment and so they don’t try to even reach for what could bring joy to their life.
Is living on your terms just another way to say do what makes you happy?
It can appear like that at first. Some people believe that their terms are nothing but what brings them joy, and these people are often the ones who are emotionally stunted because they avoid the trials that life presents them. Living a life on your terms is living your life with the intention of getting the most from it. This means that you have to face those rough periods in your life. You have to go through the discomforts of daily life. You can’t simply run from it because those aren’t your terms.
Living your life on your terms takes a lot of thought work. It takes you being as intentional to reach your goals and aspiring to keep going when you do make it. You do have the difficult task of having to let some relationships go because they have run their course and be OK with letting those old tried and true friends go. So you are able to make room for new friends who will help you become the better man.
Many want the phrase, “live life on your terms”, to mean they can do whatever they want, and that isn’t the case. Living your life on your terms is about finding a path to fulfillment. The point of fulfillment is whether or not you reach your goals through the limitations you have. You see many young adults deciding they want to try to find fulfillment by changing the definitions of words, and going beyond the limitations of what they were born as. Yet because they want to try to make a shortcut they are actually bringing more misery themselves. Showing that nearly half of all transgenders try to commit suicide. Life won’t let you take a shortcut. Life is a cruel and strict teacher, but when you learn the lesson it wants you to learn you will never forget it. If you try to cheat the process you will be awarded a very bitter experience short of any of the joy and fulfillment you crave.
So do you just rush headlong into free untethered abandon? No, the limitations that are on you actually help you become that better man. You become stronger and more imaginative when you are forced to operate within confines.
How do you even start living your life on Your Terms?
So you realize that you have spent your days miserable. You have tried to blame everybody under the sun for the lack of fulfillment you have in your life. The blaming hasn’t worked, and the buffering against the emotions hasn’t worked. It is time for you to step up and take control of your life and live it with intentionality. Stop just letting life happen to you but you want to actually start living life. Experience it to its fullest and taste every last beautiful drop. So what do you do?
Dream
Many men have stopped allowing themselves to dream from the time they were small kids. The sad fact is that these men forget that they can dream. These men need to dream often to find their joy and passion.
This is what you need to do. Start allowing yourself to dream. Look at those dreams and see how they fit into your life. Some won’t, they are just fun exercises to try. While others are interesting and you might explore. Then there are the ones that just grab you and won’t let you go. They hold on with the fervor of a passionate maniac. These are the fun ones. The dreams that actually scare you. The dreams that you can’t shake. Many men run from these because they are fearful of the possibilities. I ask you what if…
What if You could reach that goal?
What would happen?
What if the thought that you would fail was a lie?
Would you try then?
What if you had nothing holding you back?
What would you do then?
Keep asking those what-ifs. Then write down your thoughts and explore the possibilities. See which ones are really possible. Yeah experiencing space would be cool but that’s not something I can do as of right now. I may but that isn’t my priority.
The Next part of dreaming is choosing where you want to go and dreaming about that. What will it feel, smell, and sound like? What would you be dressed in? How would you act? All these are important thoughts and questions to help you really dream. Choose which dream you want to start with. It doesn’t matter which one just starts on one.
Face your past
As you start to explore the possibilities you will have people who will start pointing out your past. You will have to face that past at some time. Yeah, there are things that you are ashamed of. There are people who you have let down. However, you have to be able to forgive those who wronged you and forgive yourself. You have to be able to forgive and forget and move on. If you don’t, that past thinking you will do will be nothing but a huge anchor holding you back.
The past is a place that you can learn from. It is also like the tar baby from Song of the South. If you are too obsessed with the past it will trap you as it did Br’er Rabbit.
Future focus
There are two ways to look at the possibility. What you can do and what you have not done. One is focused on the future and one is focused on the past. It is easy to see which one you focus on by listening to the words you use. “I have never done this before,” is looking to the past. While “This is a new experience,” is looking to the future.
The past is a tricky foe. So you have to be diligent in working on being forgiving if you find yourself sitting in the past. We like to look out of the rearview mirror way too much.
Draw a road map
How are you going to reach your goal? What problems do you foresee on the trip? Lay out your plans. Let your mind’s eye soar here. It will help you find and keep the excitement you have for the adventure you are about to embark on.
Talk to others
While making plans, talk to others. There are many men who have gone out and been to those lands that you hope to reach. You will come to understand what their terms were. Their terms of success, their terms for happiness. This is something you can learn from each person.
You also learn what they found to avoid. Some things you won’t be able to avoid and as long as you take these new experiences as part of the plan you will sail over them.
Learn to rely on Numero Uno
Yeah, the main guy you want to rely on is yourself. Sadly you will let yourself down from time to time. We aren’t perfect. So you want to babel to give yourself some grace from time to time. Beating yourself up over learning something doesn’t serve you and forgiving yourself for taking a little extra time to learn it is a good thing to do.
Your terms are dependent on only you. Your sense of accomplishment is only dependent on you. This is why if you want to find fulfillment in your life you have to actually focus on the one person you most often avoid. We have to start caring for who we are, and not running ourselves down. Will it happen? Yeah, and when it does there will be a lesson to learn. Learn it and then move on.
When you are able to stand on your own, you come to understand that you have all the confidence you need within you. That self-confidence is already there. Just waiting for you to tap into it and run.
Living your life on your terms means so much more than what society wants it to mean. Men need to have a sense of fulfillment and it takes the work of bettering themselves to do so. You have to be able to overcome the objections from others and yourself. People will work to try to get youtube to feel bad because they don’t want to follow. You can be OK with that and still love them for staying behind.
