Ez made a good point in her blog yesterday that I want to elaborate on, and that is the point of doing what you love.

We are lucky to live in a world with endless choices and opportunities. We can do whatever we want, learn whatever we want, and experience whatever we're interested in. The only problem is, at the end of the day when it comes to choosing a path to follow (I may have mentioned before, but I prefer to call it a path than a career, it just sounds less...responsible).

The thing is, with so many choices available, people are, for some strange reason, sacrificing the happiness you can achieve from doing what you love, in order to make money. Sacrificing happiness for money. Doesn't that sound MAD???

Over a span of about four years I must have changed my mind...10 or so times about what I wanted to do. And each time I was focussed on the end result. I wanted to be a PR chick, a business chick, a magazine editor, a writer,  a book editor and publisher, a photo journalist, a journalist. You have no idea how frustrating it was to think "Yay, I've finally found the right path for me!" only to be massively disappointed when I changed my mind again.

The thing was, I was taking my interests (writing, meeting and helping people, books and reading) and trying to choose the most glamourous, exciting, best paid job I could think of, that would use these interests. I wanted an exciting job with lots of exciting events, hardly any office work, and lots of interesting people. Recipe for failure.

I finally learnt that those were the things my ego wanted, not the REAL me. My ego was the one that said "I want an interesting job, lots of money and lots of recognition." My ego was running the show, but the REAL me was getting sick of it leading me down the wrong paths. My ego decided I wanted a job at a magazine like Vogue or Rolling Stones. The REAL me got me this gig with REAL Mag. And although there's no money involved, the happiness and satisfaction factor with REAL mag is (I imagine) far outweighing that of any other mag.

So, it didn't take me long to discover what it was the REAL me wanted to do. After a lifetime of fascination with anything supernatural, the occult, psychic phenomena, magick, crystals, healing, meditation and yoga the choice was pretty obvious. And guess what? As of Monday 1st of Feb I will start teaching meditation classes. As of the middle of Feb I am starting a Diploma of Metaphysics in Crystal Therapy and Reiki. And as of March I will be a practicing Crystal Therapist. No, there's not a lot of money involved. But do you think that matters when I'm doing exactly what I love, and exactly what everyone says they can imagine me doing (even my conservative family members, which really tells me something!)? It seems I've finally found the right path for me. Once I stopped focussing on what type of job/ how much money/ what cool people I can meet, I found my path of happiness.

Do you get what I'm trying to say? If you only ever focus on what your ego wants, you're never, EVER going to be truly happy. Your REAL self wants to help people and make a difference. Your ego wants to know what's in it for you. Which voice do you think will keep you happy the longest. Learn to differentiate between the two and you'll save yourself a LOT of trouble.

Peace out!

xxMELxx

On REAL's twitter yesterday Mel wrote 'If we stopped thinking of ourselves and focused on humanity.' I watched the SBS news last night (for the first time in a while) and it made me realise how lucky I am, to be here, safe and loved.  

As floods drown the people of Peru, I sit at my desk writing this blog, drinking coffee and listening to Triple J on my headphones.  

Yesterday a Haitian man was pulled out of the rubble, fifteen days after an earthquake hit Haiti leaving 170,000 dead. In that time I went out with friends, saw a movie, went to the beach, water skied, swam, drank and listened to the Hottest 100.

Sometimes I forget how lucky I am. I complain about stupid things, I have pathetic arguments with people I love, at times I can be selfish, vain and self-centred. It is during such times that I forget that I am not the only person living in this world, and maybe, just maybe I should stop focusing on myself for one second and realise that there are people worse off than me, that I actually have an amazing life, full of amazing people and opportunity.

I am reading a book at the moment called Gogo Mama. It is written by Sally Sara, who is an Australian journalist. Sally tells the story of twelve women living across Africa. I have just finished the first story about a woman called Helen. At a young age Helen’s family was attacked by a rebel group. The boys in the rebel group cut off her lips to illustrate their power and strength, leaving a scar that could not be removed.

Helen's story is just one of many African women who endure a lifetime of pain and humility due to the actions of others. I cannot begin to imagine what she went through or how she even survived. Imagine if your lips were cut off tomorrow. Would your friends accept you? Would society accept you? Would you accept yourself?

But it is not the lips that make Helen's story interesting; it is her will to live, her ability to continue to love, care and nurture others around her and her ability to see past appearance. She quotes at the end of the chapter...

'Everybody who is born, is born without a scar. They just happen in the course of life. People who attach too much importance to appearance are shallow thinkers. They are shallow. We should accept people the way they are. Let us not despise whatever God has given.'

I often get caught up in the body image, beauty, skinny debate, talking about who is REAL and who is not. Sure these issues are important, but how important, when floods devastate countries, earthquakes destroy lives, bushfires tear apart families?

I think it is time to stop focusing on ourselves and invest energy in the things we love doing, the people we love hanging out with, the activities that make us smile and the ideas that help to create master pieces.

In the year 2010 I will remember Helen's story. I will remember that we are all born without scars and throughout our lives we gain scars that we may or may not like. Those scars do not taint us; instead they give us strength, perspective and the ability to love both ourselves and those around us.

Scars make us REAL, and REAL we are.