Journey over Destination

Every person views the definition of a walk, a journey, and a destination differently, overlooking the similarity each has to offer – surrounding yourself with the beauty of life.

Be it a walk you are taking or a journey you are embarking on, all of it is reaching a destination – your goal. That goal is your motive to progress in life and face all odds. But through this walk of life, what people often forget is the joy that comes from a ride. With the road bumps and hurdles that come, one may focus on their frequent appearance rather than what lies before them or around them.

Shifting your focus on the setbacks will only hinder your path. They will obstruct your view. When you start focusing on the negative, your mind will develop a pattern of only looking out for all that could go wrong then contemplate how you can walk over a road bump.

However, if you are to take a deep breath and focus on your path, you will see how things look before you and around you. Importantly, when you take time to focus on your journey, you will see how far you have walked. It must have seemed incomprehensible to come this far when you would have initially begun your walk, yet look at you.

The key to looking at things comes through the art of a long walk. When you have been walking for a long, you learn how to be ok with the pace. The concept of instant gratification goes away with the wind since you will always have the ability to turn and look back at the starting point, then turn and look ahead at your destination. The progress you commenced will serve as a humble reminder of acknowledgment.

Above all, when you learn how to take each step toward your destination, you are training your mind to be patient with things. You are teaching yourself that you cannot fly over to your dreams; rather, you have to accept the timing of your journey.

Through this training, the other thing you are doing is becoming conscious. As you grow consciousness, you can focus on your progress and development. By doing so, you can rationalize peace over anger.

You see, when you rush through something, the frenzy of getting things done rapidly comes at the cost of refusing awareness of all that you have achieved. When you are unaware of your achievements, your mind will start to think of itself poorly. Some of these may be to the extreme lengths of feeling worthless despite having worked hard.

To prevent all of this, you have to learn how to accept life. That can be done through the art of a walk. You may notice that whenever you walk, after a while, your pace and tone calm down. That is because you are giving yourself the time to let it all out, and once you are done, what we think of as venting, your mind comes to peace after letting out. The only perk is that you do not take a walk with the person or situation you are mad at, saving you from a lot of damage.

The walk you are taking serves as a medium for you to go on, giving you the impression that time is infinite. Your mind will comprehend and copy this to your problems too. Confused? Let me make it simpler. When you start a walk, you may vent for thirty minutes tops? Then what happens? You continue to walk. Why? Because the act of going on starts to bring you subconscious comfort.

You are going on despite all that is happening. That feeling brings subtle peace, making you take one step after another. Then, as this motion becomes a drill, your mind, having expressed all that was hovering above it, starts to relax. Nothing is burdening your mind now. It is all out on the path you have walked….in fact, left behind.

You continue walking, though, because it is giving you a sense of serenity. At this point, your mind finally starts to take notice of its surrounding. Be it pavement, your mind will absorb the creaks on the path and the cars passing by. It will fall into a mindless drift of being fascinated by each thing it sees. Your woes that you began with, by now, are behind you.

Your steps will feel lighter as your body would have gotten rid of all disturbing thoughts.

Another example to help you understand this magic is through a car ride or road trip. People enjoy the ride more than reaching the actual destination. That’s because it is the journey that brings about endless incidents than reaching a destination. When you reach a destination, your goal comes to an end, leaving you wondering what next.

However, the ride keeps you anticipating the moment you would reach your designated destination. The ride then gets filled with the companionship of your solitude/music/friends/family/ and even a book. The ideology behind this is that when you are taking a ride, your mind accepts that you cannot do anything else until you reach a point.

When you make peace with the fact that you cannot do something to speed up the process of your ride or walk, your mind relaxes. Again, we have talked about this in the previous chapter as external stimuli. Do you see how interconnected your life is?

Each step you take does lead to something bigger collectively. So why fret over your situation when all of your actions will redirect you to where you are supposed to be? Instead, focus on the journey you are on. Take the time to explore your surroundings.

Be ok with the pace you are walking at – you like it. Only, you have to make the conscious decision of leaving your anger behind and focus on what stands before you. Enjoy your surroundings. Experience the world around you at your pace.

“Waiting in line” for the bus story.- Can you please direct toward the bus story?