"As you go along in life, ask yourself, `Is this worthy of my soul?' `Is this
what I'm meant to be doing?'"
On every birthday, Nikos Kazantzakis, the author of Zorba the Greek and The Last
Temptation of Christ, wrote a letter to his grandfather, whom he called "El
Greco," about what he had done with the past year. Even after his grandfather died,
Kazantzakis continued to write these "Reports to Greco," reporting what life had
taught him during the year by what it had caused to have happen to him, and how he’d
responded.
We can actively influence the course of our lives and hear what life has to say to us by
doing something similar. Each year around your birthday or New Years, reflect back over
the previous year. Look back on everything that happened and ask, "What does life
seem to be saying to me by what's happened to me? What messages and learnings am I
getting?"
When you sense you have an idea of the messages life is sending to you, use them to decide
what your priorities will be during the coming year. Choose the things that you want to
pay the most attention to next year. Form it into a motto to keep with you to continually
remind you of it. And then, throughout the year, ask yourself at the start of every
quarter, and month and week what you could do toward acting on, living up to or doing your
part to achieve or deserve the fates help in attaining it.