Learn to Reflect ... It's the Key

I used to wonder a few years ago how it was that I had gotten to where I was and had overcome so much, but learned so many lessons of life.

I think the key is ...
REFLECTION!

In my lifetime, I've taken many roadtrips. My closest friends and family know that I've spent a couple of hundred days driving across country in my lifetime all alone.

On those trips, things have happened. For instance, once I was driving my Explorer from Michigan to Seattle, WA when my fuel pump burst and the engine started to overheat. Now, I don't remember the first time that something like this happened to me on the road, but things have happened very often.

Once, I tried to turn around a UHAUL truck with a trailer (with my car) on the back on a side road in Nevada and buried the truck up almost 2 feet deep in the sand on the shoulder on an Indian Reservation. Later in that same trip, I got a flat with a UHAUL truck.

Another time, my timing belt busted in the middle of the road and I had to coast to the next exit ramp and gas station.

The recurring theme here is ... STUFF HAPPENS. I've never stopped, buried my head in my lap and cried. I've just handled the accidents, incidents and the rest. That built a lot of independence and strength in my soul.

Moreover, when I would reach my destination in Seattle, Atlanta, Miami, Louisiana, San Francisco or whereever I was headed, something would usually happen unexpectedly there as well. I began to realize that this was God's way of speaking to me.

On the long drives back home, I would began to talk to myself after about 10 hours straight on the road. Anyone who has driven across country knows that after about 16 hours of driving, you get "loopy". Things start to blend together, you start to hear sounds, you may even begin to hear voices. I don't know what that is, but the longest straight driving session I ever had alone was on a trip to Seattle for Christmas one year.

I drove the first 33 HOURS straight!!! That's correct. I drove almost one day and a half by myself across the country in some of the worst driving conditions I've ever been in. I probably would have made it to Seattle without stopping except that the snowstorm got so bad and it was approximately 3AM and I couldn't see the road anymore. So, I pulled over on the shoulder on a mountain roads behind some semi trucks and slept in the back seat curled up in a thermal blanket.

The conversations that I began to have on these long trips would go something like: "What am I doing with my life? Why did I do that to that person? Why did I say that? What am I going to do next? Why am I here? Am I doing what I'm supposed to be doing?" and so on.

Well, at first, these were just questions to keep me entertained and conscious on the road. Then, they became reflections. I would turn off the radio and just start to listen to the answers. I would talk back and forth to myself.

My mom used to say, "Yes. I talk to myself because myself has the best answers." I think that's true. I gained so much wisdom and insight by forcing myself to reflect on my life and experiences and build and plan from that point forward.

On my last long road trip from California home after the Silicon Valley crash, I asked myself, "What's your purpose in life?" After a LOT of back and forth, I came up with "1) to teach and 2) to spread love." That was an epiphany for me! I was like, "oh ... that's right. I get that. That's me.

So, I started telling people that that are close to me: friends, family, church members, colleagues and the like. And ... it became a self-fulfilling prophecy.

I don't recommend that anyone drive across country alone for 33 hours or more to find themselves or discover their life's purpose, but I do recommend that you take time to go to the beach, have a massage, sit in silence for hours and just reflect on your life. Reflect on the mistakes that you made and the lessons you learned and possibly the lessons that you overlooked.

If you do this I guarantee will quickly be enriched!