“We only live once, but if we do it right, once is enough”
– Mae West
I came across this wonderful quote from Mae West a few years back and it immediately resonated. I would think of these words often as years go by, it serves as a great reminder to live life to its fullest.
Read More: 10 Empowering Quotes To Live By
But what does living life to its fullest really mean? Though the exact meaning of this phrase can be subjective, to me, it generally means to perceive life as a gift and give it our all to realize and live our best life.
Unsurprisingly, most people will immediately chime in with replies along the lines of “but I can’t live my life to its fullest because I don’t have enough.. money, time, strength and so forth.. “.
In other words, many will quickly resort to make excuses and place blame on external circumstances or others as to why they can not live the life they dream of living.
The truth is, our ability of creating and living our ideal life depends entirely on us.
Whilst it may be true that having more money, time, and a whole lot of other resources than what we already have could help us to live a better life than we are currently living, we can start to improve our lives by doing one simple yet effective action: by shifting our perception.
What I mean by this is that we can immediately live a better life by realizing just how wonderful our life already is, by being grateful and acknowledging the good things that we already have as opposed to longing something that we do not have (yet).
Gratitude is absolutely essential to living our best life and the bonus is that is has the power to attract even more good things into our lives.
That said, I’m not in any way suggesting to completely ignore challenges, issues, or problems that we are currently facing but we can always choose to see the silver lining.
Read More: The Advantages of Challenges
As the great Maya Angelou wisely said “If you don’t like something, change it, if you can’t, change your attitude about it, don’t complain”.
In order for us to create a great life – a life truly worth living – we must create a beautiful mind that emphasizes positivity. This includes seeing challenges and issues as a blessing in disguise that has the capabilities to make us into stronger, wiser, and more resilient human beings.
The obstacles and challenges we face also have the capabilities to improve our lives but only if we decide to step up to the plate and tackle them head on.
We are all capable of living our best life and it could all start this very moment – the present moment.
Remember that our current circumstances – where we are today – is the manifestation of our past thoughts, decisions and actions.
The good news is that if you find yourself currently dissatisfied with the way your life has unfold you have the power to change it by creating better thoughts and taking better actions consistently.
Make a commitment to yourself to do the very best you can, with what you have, where you are right now. And carve out the life that you imagine yourself living.
You’ve only got 1 life, give it all you’ve got, realize your dreams and let’s live it out loud!
