Is it a good thing to put parts of your life on hold to achieve a goal?

Especially your health (physical, spiritual and mental)

Well having done it for the last 7 years while growing a family, studying for my Bachelor of Engineering (4 years full time) while working full time, suffering some serious losses in my life, changing jobs, etc.. the answer is…….

both Yes and No....

I think I have actually managed to get some balance to the way I managed these things, but I think I may have left some parts of my life go for too long.

I had to stop training in Kyokushin Karate as I needed the time to study

I left my other goals and dreams behind and now I’m trying to play catch-up.

I now have conflicts where all the work I put into my engineering degree says I should do something with it i.e. “Be an Engineer”, but a lot of the things I now want to do (brew master, writing, increased family time, other income generation) doesn’t fall into line with that stream of thinking – possibly the brew master dream does where I now have the skills to engineer my own brewery, the others go against the normal direction of becoming an Engineer where the usual outcome is to work for an employer (or yourself which is still ‘working ‘ for an employer) and to work hard and long hours, where the other things I want to do go against this.

I stopped deliberate meditation, whileI may have been meditating when studying or focused intently on some things or when trying to relax when stress was building up, I was not regularly ‘centring’ myself with meditation

In hindsight I should not have dropped the meditation as it may have helped get through some particularly tough times that my wife and I had to go through and the physical exercise would not have hurt either, although I did try to do some exersise when I could, it was no-where at the level it should have been.

 So was it a good idea or not to put aspects of my life on hold for an extended period?

 I don’t think there is an acceptable answer to that question

on the surface – No, 

but in doing it I achieved something that I never dreamed I would ever do, I became a university graduate, and now I believe I can do what ever I want.

I think at the time I really had no idea what I wanted, to be honest I don’t think I had even considered thinking about what I wanted to do or be I just drifted along with the flow, which is interesting as one gentleman I have a huge amount of respect for always said to me that he thought that I had a fantastic driving ambition and had the ability to go with it, but in reality I was just drifting along in my life, things tended to happen when they needed to, a job would come up when I needed a change, when I needed to learn a lesson from my current job there would be no new jobs there, my peers would change, forcing me to change and develop, but all of this was with-out conscious goals – I just drifted, so putting things on hold and studying hard really put me under pressure and has now made me look at my life and what I’d really like to do with it I’m still not really 100% sure but at least now I’m looking at it

So for me while I was in that drifting along mode (I think it’s sometimes referred to ‘living your life by default’)  I had some dreams but had set no goals, I needed to put them all aside, set my goal and push myself, and struggle a bit to get to where I am today.

 So where did it get me?

I have a good job that provides well for my family, it does not pull me away from my family as many of my other jobs used too, I am now consciously looking at what I really want to do, I recognise the need for physical activity and meditation, and it’s all helping myself and my family, even though my wife does not see why I am so interested in personal development and how it could help anything (too “new agey”) I can see marked improvements in our relationship on both sides, I feel more positive than I have for around 10 years, I feel more confident in the advice I can give others in various areas and I want to write my experiences so others might read it one day and say ‘hey maybe I should give that a try’.

So should you do it? Only if it suits…. I know that’s not an answer but to be honest there is no answer this is how it happened for me, maybe it would work for you and maybe not.

The most important thing is to act, to do something and not just drift along in life or bury yourself in “looking but not doing”