People frequently wonder where they go after death. Few ask where they were before birth.
What if we select the broad strokes of our life before we arrive?
What if we select our parents, our talents, our interests and our biggest adversities and successes before we ever arrive?
I believe we do. And deep inside, I believe we remember.
Here is a photo my parents staged when I was 2.
Here is a photo of me on vacation in Jackson Hole, Wyoming at age 10.
The west immediately grabbed my heart. It was love at first sight and I wanted to move here ever since. I visited Wyoming again at age 12, 15, 17 and 34. I finally arranged my life to move here permanently. I’ve lived in Wyoming the past 27 years.
Here is a photo of me on my sting-ray bicycle.
It was my first magic carpet. It extended my circumference of freedom from our immediate neighborhood to 6 miles in all directions. I later traded up to Schwinn Varsity 10-speeds. I’m still drawn to bicycle shops. Their rubber tires smell like freedom to me.
Here is a photo of me as a young lad in front of the trailer home I lived in until age 5.
I’ve always been drawn to trailers. I shopped for them as a teenager. My first home was a doublewide trailer. I’ve loved owning and traveling in RVs. I was able to early-retire due to owning trailer parks. Like those paper routes and bikes, they provide financial and time freedom. But the cherry on top is passive income. No more work schedules.
Writing. The west. Bicycles. Passive income. Clearly the overall theme of my life has been a reach for more and more freedom. I’ve never had a deeper realization of that, than just this moment, writing this sentence.
I think we know what we want here before we arrive. Chasing it is a path we blazed that brings joy and fulfillment. We stacked the deck before we arrived to make the tough duty of life on earth, in a body, a bit easier than it might otherwise be. Our deep desires are markers on a trail to keep us from getting lost. They are bread crumbs we baked for ourselves, pointing to journeys that will fulfill this life’s mission.
Once we’ve grown as large as our imaginations, beliefs, actions and bodies can take us, we return home to the collective consciousness. The place we eternally inhabit before “birth.”
So how does this relate to You?
Your work isn’t your life. Your income isn’t your wealth. Your desires aren’t your mission. You’re bigger than them all. You already had everything before you arrived. You have it right now. You’ll have it forever. Your growth and awareness and love and joy just keep expanding.
So lighten up. Enjoy the ride. Trust that you know your path. Do what lights you up. Don’t let something as small as a job or a relationship or a medical issue blind you to who you really are.
Everything on earth is temporary.
Except you.
Live like you know it.
###
Mike Johnson made the journey from jobs to freelance writer to entrepreneur to passive income and early retirement. Today he teaches people how to skip right to passive income and early retirement at WorldsBestWriter.com .
Once I learned how to BUY passive income, I stopped chasing the bucks and the bucks started chasing me!