“Be miserable. Or motivate yourself. Whatever has to be done, it’s always your choice.”
Dr. Wayne Dyer
I recently heard something that really resonated with me. It comes from Dr. Wayne Dyer, an acclaimed, internationally best-selling author. Listening to him give a talk about the 10 principles of success and prosperity, one of those principles in particular stood out to me.
Specifically, he said this — Don’t die with your music still inside of you. It was also the title to one of his books, published in 2014. So what does this really mean and why is it so important? Well, here’s the thing. We all have something inside of us, a gift if you will, that we must share with the world.
However, most of us, for one reason or another, don’t share this gift because we worry about what others would think or say about us. In effect, we die with our music still inside of us. And what a shame that is. If there is one message that can resonate with everyone, it really is just this.
The Music Inside You Is Screaming To Be Heard
I don’t mean to be ominous when I say this, but we’re all going to die. Whether that’s a year from now, ten years from now, 50 years from now or maybe even a hundred years from now, it’s going to happen. One way or another, there’s no denying it. It’s a fact of life. We’re all hurtling towards our impending death.
Yet, how many of us put off for tomorrow, what we can do today? How many of us postpone and procrastinate, coming up with an endless array of excuses as to why we can’t do it now. We wait until next Monday, next week, next month, and even, sometimes, next year. Well, now is the time to act. The time is most certainly now.
As I write these words, the world is struggling with a pandemic. As a result, people are stuck at home. Locked down. Quarantined. Most think it’s a staycation. Others are too worried and stressed out to figure out what to do. How do you insulate yourself? Your income? Your family? One way is to take action and to let that music inside of you play at full force.
Living With Regret Is Avoidable If You Let Your Music Be Heard
When you get to the end of your life, you don’t regret not making more money, working longer hours, or buying that supercar you’ve always dreamt of. No. Not for a moment. In fact, you regret something else. Something far more salient.
Most people think that life is about keeping up with the Jones’ and collecting shiny objects. But the truth is that people on their deathbed don’t have regrets about those things. They regret not taking chances, not pursuing their dreams, not saying things on their mind, and not following their passions in life.
Those regrets are avoidable. Take the chance today. Make the call. Start the business. Pursue your passions. Set major goals and set out to achieve them with one small action every day. Be happy. Healthy. And spiritually connected to your Creator. That is what life is about. Don’t die with that music inside of you. Let it be heard.
In retrospect, we can all say we wish we could have or would have done or said something. That’s easy to say. Hindsight is, in fact, 20-20. But more specifically, to break this down into a recipe for living life, here are the things you must do to ensure that your music doesn’t die with you.
1. Audit Your Time
It’s hard to see the things we do on a regular basis. By the time we reach the age of 35 years-old, 95% of our activities are unconscious. Meaning that we are habitual creatures who often revert back to the things we do on a regular basis.
Some of the things we do might be entirely detrimental. Smoking, drinking alcohol, recreational drugs, gambling, procrastination, overspending, and eating poorly are just some of the examples of habits that become ingrained in us. Since these are learned activities that often develop over years (sometimes even decades) it’s hard to be honest with yourself.
Yet, in order to break through the proverbial noise out there and to overcome our innermost tendencies to revert back to bad habits, you have to audit your time. So how exactly does this work? Simple, take a spreadsheet and split it up into 48 blocks of 30 minutes. Each sheet represents one day. Create 7 sheets to track 7 days of behavior.
Each day, jot down what you did during the 30-minute block while being brutally honest with yourself. If you played games on your phone or ate fast food, smoked cigarettes, or whatever, jot it down. If you did something productive, jot it down. It’s also important to indicate the time you went to bed at night and woke up in the morning every single day.
After the week is up, look back to see what you did. Then, count up all the productive blocks and all the non-productive, habitual blocks. How did you fare? This is very eye-opening to say the least. This works so well because the ego can no longer hide your unconscious behavior.
2. Create A Not-To-Do List
Not too long ago, during a meeting at the $100k Group with Dean Graziosi and Joe Polish, Dean talked about something that really resonates with me still to this day. Lots of people create a list of goals and what they need to do every single day. But not many people have a list of the things they should not do every day.
Meaning, you must create a not-to-do list. What are you doing very single day that you shouldn’t be doing. What are you wasting your time on? Are they bad habits that are holding you back? Destructive behavior? Drugs? Alcohol? Excessively shopping? Binge watching Netflix?
We all have things that we often do, that we know we should not be doing. But the ego has a very clever way of hiding these from the mind. That’s why you have to create a not-to-do list so that you can remind yourself of it. As you read this list every morning, it will help illuminate behavior that might be setting you back in life rather than propelling you forward.
3. Meditate Every Single Day
Whether you believe it or not, “we are not human beings having a spiritual experience, we are spiritual beings having a human experience.” While French Philosopher, Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, has received credit for saying this, it was Dr. Wayne Dyer who reminded me of this important saying.
Because we are spiritual beings having a human experience, we must tap into the infinite intelligence that is giving us and every other thing on this planet, life. By tapping into this spiritual intelligence, whether you call this God, Allah, Buddha, or just that universal oneness that binds us all, we can discover our true calling and purpose in this life.
Your purpose, and why you were put here on this planet, is far greater than your problems or whatever obstacles you think might be standing in your way. Do not live life without allowing your true calling to shine. In other words, do not die with that music still inside of you. Rather, tap into it with some simple meditation.
Meditation, however, is hard. Especially for the untrained mind. To be still requires a certain sense of discipline. Yet, that stillness, or no-mind as it’s called in the East, is our natural state of being. It is our minds that cloud this stillness. Find a good source for learning meditation and do it every single day without fail and watch as your life’s purpose begins to shine.
4. Eliminate Toxins From Your Life
Nearly a decade ago, I made a decision that changed the course and trajectory of my life forever. It allowed me to tap into the music inside of me. I didn’t know it was there. And I only just discovered it when I made this choice. The funny thing is that one he choice wasn’t a difficult one to make at that period in my life.
The choice was to eliminate all toxins from my life. No alcohol, drugs, nothing that could alter my state of awareness and perception. It had become such a part of me that it was pervasive and became the root of so many problems. I knew it needed to be done. And the sheer moment that I relinquished those things, a very powerful shift occurred.
It took about 6 months for my clouded mind to clear. Those neurotoxins created by things like drugs and alcohol seem to permeate your enter sense of self. But when those dark clouds lifted, my mind was very much like a laser-beam, inherently focused on progress rather than perfection.
That’s when I started writing. That’s when I started sharing my music with the world. And it has impacted so many lives as this blog that you’re reading here has an audience in the many millions, that single decision has helped me to help you. If toxins are an issue for you, I implore you to relinquish them.
5. Manage Clock Time Effectively
Eckhart Tolle, in his iconic book, The Power of Now, refers to clock time as a sort of psychological time. Since time is simple a construct of our reality, and in the quantum world there is no dimension of time, managing clock time effectively is still an important tool. The truth is that most of us do not manage our clock time well enough.
We do things like procrastinate and waste time. Instead of doing things to move forward, we focus on the the past and dwell in a state of frustration, fear and anxiety. I understand how difficult it can feel and how easy it is to beat yourself up. But you must become an effective manager of your time if you want to move forward in life.
When you can manage your time, anything is possible. This isn’t just about your not-to-do list. It’s about utilizing the most precious resource you have. Why is it so precious? Well, once you use up your time, it’s gone forever. It’s not like money. Money can be lost but regained. Not time. So manage it effectively.
6. Create Your MIT List At Night
Your Most Important Tasks (MITs) of the day are crucial. Tackle those first and foremost. And make your list the night before. Meaning, since you’re so fresh in the morning, you must tackle the things that will help you get the most progress. In other words, the things that will ensure you don’t die with your music still inside of you.
For example, Stephen King has had the habit of writing 2,000 words every single day without fail. No matter what, it’s a habit he built up. Similarly, no matter what dream you have inside of you, do things that will help you realize it first thing in the morning.
At first it will feel like nothing is happening and no progress is being made. But believe me that things most certainly build up over time. Just don’t expect overnight results to occur in anything that you do in life. It simply doesn’t work that. way.