I enjoy following James Smith PT, his podcasts are great (so is his hot bod…) I often listen to them whilst running. He talks a lot of sense and cuts to the chase, he gets straight to the point and tells it like it is. I read his books and blogs too and this morning a line he said really struck me.

You’re not a finished product.

It’s so true isn’t it? I’ve written before about Keeping on working on yourself and how Michael Cain talks in his books about never stopping learning your craft and this line really help reinforce that. I think sometimes we do keep working on ourselves but with the mindset that we’ll reach and end point but as James goes onto say, we’re more malleable than we realise, we are ever changing and growing and we need to stop thinking of ourselves as the finished article.

My best friend is an inspiration to me, I am her too. But neither one of us is perfect, far from it. The pair of us have all sorts of nuances and traits we dislike, we have negative thoughts, imposter syndrome and all sorts! We openly admit it. But what makes our friendship work is that together we keep working on stuff. We don’t accept these faults and downfalls to ourselves. We regularly discuss our approaches and strategies and small self care tips and techniques to try better ourselves. Because we know we’re not done yet. However we are also both guilty of never being happy, we’re always chasing something. We can’t sit still and what we really need to do is try balance it.

That’s what’s key, balance, like a diet, health eating is about balance rather than complete restriction, so is bettering yourself. I think what I need to do is balance it. I need to learn to be happy and content with what I have got and have achieved whilst also continuing to keep working on improving myself, making sure that bettering myself isn’t at the compromise of my happiness but that actually it’s fuelling it.

It’s all about mindset, changing thought patterns from, “I’ll be happy when…” to, “I’ll be happy whilst I work towards..” it’s about enjoy the ride rather than the momentary cheer at the finish line. That’s where the balance comes in. Like buying something new, an outfit, shoes, car, house, whatever, there’s that initial excitement and enjoyment when first using or wearing it but then shortly after the novelty wears off and it’s just another dress, set of wheels or coffee table. It’s about learning to take those moments for what they are and not letting the novelty wearing off and anti climax of something being over become an unhappy dwelling and sadness.

It’s so hard and it’s probably one of the hardest things I find to get right. I always have to be doing something. I always have to find some sort of fault in my life to be working on. It’s like I always been to be striving towards something which is good, it means I keep working on myself and accepting that I’m not the finished product but I need to balance it. I need make sure that it’s not at the expense of contentment and happiness. Guess that’s what I’m working on at the moment…see not a finished product!