Bear in mind these two philosophies:
- When you lose yourself in an interest you love, you find yourself.
- For vigorous personal growth, fertilise your natural talents with passionate interests and mix often with positive like-minded people.
Think of recreation by dropping the first ‘re’ to form the word ‘creation. Recreation becomes any interest that you freely choose to do because it creatively expresses the real you, your talents and for your intrinsic enjoyment.
- The interest doesn’t have to be physical (but if that’s your preference, go for it!). It can be physical, mental, intellectual, spiritual, social, environmental, manual.
- Its an interest in which you are totally in control.
- You decide when and where you want to pursue that interest, at your chosen pace, to your preferred level of skill and effort
- Preferably it is an interest totally unrelated to work or any other pursuit that is the source of your stress and burning up of energy.
- These sort of interests are not tied to the old idea of weekends. You enjoy them at any time of the week, day or night, according to your own schedule of priorities
- You don’t have to belong to a club or other interest group if that is not your preference – but note also there is now a huge variety of recreational-based organizations offering programs to suit just about every taste if you want to share your interest with others.
- Impulse interests (you can do anytime you like for as long as you like) are the most popular and easiest to fit into your busy lifestyle.
- These sort of interests are not secondary to other interests or responsibilities – they are vitally important to your health, resilience, life satisfaction, self esteem, self confidence, self belief and sense of self worth. The other so-called “more important” activities will suffer over time if you don’t allow yourself regular valuable ‘me time’.
- The more frequent you can allow yourself to enjoy this interest, the more you will get out of the rest of your life - for the rest of your life! It’s the frequency, not the depth of your involvement that makes the difference.
- It can be as short and simple as having coffee with a friend, singing in the shower, playing with the kids, doing some having a quick game of tennis with friends…going for a walk in nature…you decide…
- think back to interests you used to enjoy when you were younger that got left behind as other obligations took over your life...even as far back as your childhood years
- think about why you enjoyed them, how you felt while pursuing them. Get that feeling back again
- It's not enough to simply "switch off" from your stresses and problems. The real benefits come when you then "switch on" to a passionate interest that wholly captures your mind, body and spirit
- Nobody else – least of all me – can tell you what you should enjoy.
Make sure you have regular experiences in which you simply Enjoy Being You.
Want more? Get your copy now of "Enjoy Being You". Click here for more information.
