What Matters Most

Learned in a doctor visit: I have every right to be controlling over every circumstance of my life…and no wonder. I have been ill my whole life, due to genetics. I should enjoy controlling what little I can! I do not have to feel guilty when I get “extras” or get “out” of unpleasantness from being sick, because I also miss out on good things and have to be involved in unpleasant circumstances from being sick. My doctors have tried to get me to avoid stress, but I don’t think I understood that I really could before. Now I see my list of tasks and it is easy. I see that I don’t have to do many of the things on my list. Some stressful things can’t be avoided…taxes for instance…but so many can. I have been a taskmaster to myself and been the subject of taskmasters as a child. The rest of my life is going to be about enthusiasm and joy. I need the control of scheduling my every hour, but instead of scheduling so much unpleasantness, I am scheduling 2 hours of things I feel enthusiasm for (painting) followed by 15 minutes of unpleasantness (taxes). In reading “What Matters Most” I understand the point that the journey, not the goal, is what’s important. I dreamed of leaving The Rat Retreat behind when I die, but is that the point? Will it be the same thing 50 years from now? Likely not. But what I do in building it will matter…educating, making decisions, loving each rat I handle. And making sure that how I do it is a blessing to myself, not a stressor…matters above all. Without that, I cannot do any of the rest.