The How To of the title to this post is, I believe, the ultimate – “meta”, so to say – How To.
It is, in other words, the “How To” to end all “How To”s.
So, this is how to not worry about how to do anything in your life:
1. By Always Remaining Open And Ready
To Respond Exactly As Required
To How Things Are Evolving
Moment By Moment
Like the boy who set off to buy bread from the bakery, one sunny morning.
Then, midway to his destination, he realized he had forgotten to take any money with him.
But he didn’t turn back; he, anyway, continued marching towards the bakery.
Upon entering the shop, he immediately admitted to the baker that he did not have any money to pay him in order to procure the bread he so much wished to get. He added, though, that he was ready to do anything to pay him in any other way he – the baker – would deem desirable.
The baker told him that one of his cooks had just quit and that he was about to publish a vacancy soon, but that the job was the boy’s – at least for a trial period to begin with -should he truly wanted it.
The boy, added the baker, didn’t need to worry if he had no previous baking experience. He would teach him everything there was to know about his craft.
“Yes, of course I want the job”, readily and immediately replied the future owner of said bakery; not to mention of a sprawling baking empire.
2. By Exercising Ceaseless, Factual, Objective Observation
Like the lift attendant, who was working in one of the tallest skyscrapers, found at the very heart of this iconic Metropolitan City.
Who served everyone who happened to ride with him on the lift for the operation of which he was responsible in the exact same way.
A way that was always polite, attentive, discreet; as well as, and most importantly, tailor-made to each lift rider’s particular needs and personality.
No matter if they were multimillionaire owners of major corporations, high or medium-level executives of the same corporations, graduates doing their internships in said corporations, or “humble”, low-paid staff cleaning and maintaining them.
No matter if they treated him with respect, indifferently, or even scornfully.
And when one of our lift attendant’s most prestigious clients asked him what gift he would wish for, upon the occasion of his – the attendant’s, that is – upcoming retirement, he merely responded:
“Sir, with all due respect, if you were a bit more attentive, you would already know the answer to this question”.
“What is it then? Tell me!”, the posh lift rider eagerly asked the lift attendant back.
“The only thing I want, Sir, is to keep operating this lift, and serve each and every person who uses it, until the final day of my life”.
3. By Remembering It’s All A Fleeting Dream,
Soon To Come To An End…
So You’d Better Enjoy It!
Like the Average Office Worker (AOW), who has been working for the average big corporation for years – decades – in a row, hating his job to the marrow of his bones.
Every day he drags his feet to his desk and spends there eight (plus or minus) hours, each time feeling a little bit more disillusioned, a little bit more dejected, a little bit more desperate.
Until this fateful afternoon, when he finds himself silently crying, while sitting on a step in the purgatorial flight of stairs connecting two random floors of the gargantuan, grey and soulless building hosting his corporation.
He has on purpose chosen a spot where he knows nobody will find him.
Then, the unthinkable happens.
A few steps below him, a previously invisible hatch opens and a tiny – minuscule, really – fairy comes out of it, shiny white dress, magic wand in hand, dazzlingly beautiful face and all.
The AOW, shocked, rubs his eyes in disbelief, but the fairy stubbornly refuses to disperse into thin air, and instead remains there, staring right at (or is it through?) him.
She gives him a smile, which means everything and nothing.
The AOW then hears himself – while feeling like he doesn’t have any control over the situation, and also realizing that he never really had any control over his life – asking her:
“Why have I yet to wake up???”
The fairy’s smile widens as she retorts with a question of her own:
“Who is asking why he has yet to wake up?”
Until next time,
Don’t worry.
Don’t be happy
Just BE who you are!
By the way…