A New Year for the Journey

Adapted from the book Simple Secrets for Becoming Healthy, Wealthy & Wise, by David Niven:

Journeys are important - be they physical, metaphorical, spiritual.

The point of any journey is the travel, the process of the journey.

The process of the journey teaches us about ourselves - about who we are, what we stand for, what we need in life. Most important, the process teaches us what we are capable of. The process is a redefinition of your daily routine.

For most of us, the constants of every day are sleeping and eating. We don't forget either, because they're just too important. Think about it: regardless of pressures at work, regardless of pressures at home, regardless of emergencies that arise, we find time to sleep and eat every single day, because we understand those activities to be at the foundation of our life.

But what would you be capable of if you added time for thought and reflection to your daily foundation? What if every day, regardless of the demands on you, you put aside twenty minutes to think about that day's entry, to think about your life, to think about your journey?

Nothing changes without thought. Nothing improves without thought.

As children, we had quiet time in school. As adults, we all too often have neither quiet nor time. But no more should thinking be considered a luxury to be sacrificed to a busy day than should sleeping or eating.

The process of the journey makes you stronger in every challenge you face - for this new year and forever.