Today, I’m grateful for sacrifices.
An act of giving up something especially for the sake of someone or something else.
The purpose of making sacrifices is not to cause suffering; it's to alleviate long-term, or future suffering.
Sacrifice — what an ominous word. A word that elicits a sense of dread and foreboding.
Can we shift our mindsets and look at making sacrifices as a positive thing? So that when we think of making a sacrifice, we don’t think of it as losing something that we value. Instead, we think of it as gaining something of higher value.
3 categories of sacrifice who’s
greater value could be gained by making a sacrifice from each one.
✅Time and money
✅Comfort and gratification
✅Ego and pride
Back in 2002-2005 I sacrificed traveling, the size and location of my apartment I lived in so that I could pay debt and save to buy my first home in 2005. The value of the security you receive from owning your own home that you can pass on to your child someday is greater than the value of spending that money on a trip, an upscale apartment that I really didn’t need anyway.
Spending 4 years getting an education was a sacrifice that had greater value then me not getting my education.
Sometimes you have to sacrifice the comfort of the uncomfortable. I love a checklist but I love more is checking things off my checklist. But see that causes me to focus on the less impactful to-do’s because I’m able to check those off quicker. Which means that I have to sacrifice the instant gratification of checking a box and be satisfied if I’m only able to check off one or two to-do’s in a day that are impactful.
I have arrived at the turning point in my life where I have to sacrifice my ego and pride in exchange for the greater value of peace of mind and self-respect. Than you Lord. My peace is more important than any job, real estate transaction, or social platform.
Ego and pride will have you on path of failure and don’t want you to admit that your idea/project failed, an will have you keep going through the motions with minimal results. That’s when you need to consider sacrificing your ego and pride. Admit that the path you are on is not the right one for you, and find the greater value in your “failure.” There are bound to be many lessons to learn from that experience that can be applied to whatever you take on next. And from that resilience you gain self-respect.
What are some of the sacrifices you’ve made and the value you received from each one?
Is there something you need to decide to sacrifice now to receive something of greater value in the future?
Change your mindset about sacrifices - don’t focus on the trivial value of the sacrifice but the significant value of what you have to gain from it.