LOVE

Love Before Lack: Before the World Starts Talking

If you want a shortcut to abundance, try this tomorrow morning:

Don’t touch your phone.

Not yet.

• Before the notifications.

• Before the news.

• Before the texts.

• Before the emails.

• Before Instagram reminds you what everyone else supposedly has.

• Before your mind starts assembling its familiar list of problems to solve.

Stay where you are for another minute.

And complete one simple sentence:

• I love how …

That’s it.

• I love how my dog Finn is always so happy to see me.

• I love how my partner loves me.

• I love how I get to step outside and feel the sun on my skin.

• I love how there are people in my life who genuinely care about me.

• I love how there are people I find myself thinking about simply because I care so deeply about them.

• I love how my body carried me through another night and gave me another morning.

• I love how that first cup of coffee smells before I even take a sip.

• I love how music can change the entire atmosphere of a room, and sometimes my entire state of mind.

• I love how laughter can suddenly make everything feel less serious.

• I love how I can still learn something that changes the way I see the world.

• I love how a hug can communicate something words never quite manage.

• I love how the ocean keeps doing what the ocean does whether I’m having a good day or a terrible one.

• I love how some of the best moments in my life were never planned.

• I love how I wake up next to a beautiful human being.

• I love how I still have people to love, places to go, things to learn, and ways to be useful.

• I love how, after everything I’ve experienced, I can still be surprised by life.

And maybe the most important one:

• I love how I get another day.

Why this works

We tend to think abundance means acquiring something.

• More money.

• More security.

• More love.

• More recognition.

• More time.

• More certainty.

But there is another kind of abundance that doesn’t require acquiring anything.

It requires noticing.

Your mind is constantly deciding what deserves your attention. And whatever you repeatedly direct your attention toward begins to dominate your experience.

Start the morning thinking:

• What am I behind on?

• What could go wrong?

• Why hasn’t that person texted me?

• Do I have enough money?

• What am I going to do about this problem?

… and you’ve begun the day rehearsing scarcity.

Nothing outside you necessarily changed.

Your attention did.

Now consider what happens when the first thing you consciously practice is:

• I love how …

You begin searching.

And suddenly your mind starts finding evidence.

• My dog Finn.

• The sunlight.

• The coffee.

• The person sleeping beside you.

• The friend who checked on you.

• The daughter whose voice makes you smile.

• The body that still carries you.

• The work that allows you to be useful.

• The ridiculous joke that still makes you laugh.

• The fact that you’re here at all.

This isn’t pretending everything is wonderful.

Some mornings aren’t.

People die.

Relationships change.

Money gets tight.

Bodies hurt.

Plans collapse.

Life occasionally kicks the chair out from underneath us.

Gratitude doesn’t require denying any of that.

It simply refuses to let difficulty become the only thing we can see.

Love Before Lack

Maybe abundance isn’t something we eventually arrive at.

Perhaps it’s a frequency.

Maybe it’s a way of paying attention.

Scarcity says:

• Something is missing.

Love asks:

• What is already here?

Fear asks:

• What might I lose?

Love asks:

• What am I fortunate enough to experience right now?

And here’s the interesting part:

• You don’t need an hour-long morning routine.

• You don’t need incense.

• You don’t need a vision board.

• You don’t need to manifest a Lamborghini before breakfast.

• You need about sixty seconds.

Before your feet hit the floor tomorrow morning, try it. Don’t reach for the phone. Don’t invite the entire world into your consciousness quite yet.

Give yourself the first word:

• I love how …

Then finish the sentence.

Again.

And again.

And again.

Maybe ten times.

You might discover something surprising. The abundance you were looking for wasn’t necessarily somewhere in the future waiting for you to obtain it.

• Some of it was already lying beside you.

• Some of it was sleeping down the hall.

• Some of it was wagging its tail.

• Some of it was shining through the window.

• Some of it was beating inside your chest.

You simply hadn’t noticed it yet.

Tomorrow morning, before the world starts telling you what you need … remember what you already love !!