The Best Version of You

Life is a shifting landscape filled with good times, tough times, challenges to meet, joy to celebrate, and inherent sorrow to endure. Through it all, you create your story beginning with a DNA blueprint of built-in strengths and weaknesses and then work with them to make the most of who you are and what you are here on earth to do as you employ the art and science of living a healthy and beautiful life. The way you tackle the job of living makes your story interesting – where you choose to expend energy, how you handle difficulty, the ways in which you address success and failure, and how you treat others and yourself in the process. Free will reigns, nothing is set in stone, it’s a world of infinite possibilities, and from beginning to end, it’s not what you have, it’s what you do with it that counts. In accepting that responsibility, you can begin to write your story differently, deciding who, what, why, where, and how to turn your strengths and weaknesses into pure potential and get the most out of the life you were given. Being able to locate, unlock, and amplify the Best Version of yourself gives you your best chance at making your story a good one. In this version, you live in full accord, remaining true to yourself, real with others, and authentic in everything you say and do by using a core belief system rooted in principle and integrity. A connected mind, body, and spirit work together in lockstep to keep you headed in the right direction and going strong. You adopt a positive outlook to help yourself gracefully deal with life’s challenges, increase the chance of successful outcomes in daily situations, and turn your dreams into self-fulfilling prophecies. Health in every dimension is on your side in the choices you make and in the lifestyle you lead. Your wise decisions enhance the beauty you were born with and extend the expiration date of your youthfulness, letting you look and feel younger long past forecasted norms. This version of you generates an inner glow that radiates outward, illuminating the exterior picture you present, and helping to create a strong physical presence that is a powerful and direct reflection of your holistic health. When circumstances overwhelm and life throws you off balance, you are able to summon calm, re-center, still your mind and put it in alignment with a tranquil heart, and more easily glide through feeling better about yourself and the world around you. Your magnanimous and generous spirit is seen and felt by everyone with whom you interact, exponentially increasing throughout the decades and making your life genuinely happier, more fulfilling, and purposeful. This version is who you want to be and who the world wants to see… the one that makes your story better than good. In hindsight, your Best Version created a legacy you felt proud to pass down, one in which the sum total of your contribution counted for something, was recognized, and appreciated. You used the gifts you were given and lived in the spirit of full abandon, tackling each challenge, giving every effort, and leaving nothing undone. Your grit and determination to succeed inspired and earned the respect of others, but never more so than when you were defeated or you failed and did so like a true winner who shakes hands and congratulates their rival. Your children and children’s children couldn’t know how much you loved them but they could feel it as your spirit embraced theirs through good times and bad, and held them tight. Some saw your tenacity as matchless, your resilience as a reason to hope, and the compassion you extended as a model to follow. You made the world a better place. Above all, the one thing that stood out as your greatest achievement wasn’t found in a spectacular success or grand celebratory moment, but in the heroism of living an everyday life well, of making the most of what was right in front of you, of walking humbly with kindness and treating every fellow human being with respect, and by doing so, gracefully arriving at a place of genuine happiness and joyful reverence for all of life. You were born with a bright light… its radiance fueled by your beautiful spirit, its afterglow spilling out beyond your borders onto everyone and everything you touch. Like a mighty tree in winter that holds pure potential inside its silent branches, and the tiny pebble thrown into a pond sending rippling concentric circles outward, you are the manifestation of both promise and power. The world waits to see what you can do, who you will be, and how brightly you will shine using your hidden potential and the far-reaching influence your waves can create. Go confidently unencumbered into each day with courage and gusto, free from constraining self-doubt, disabused of insecurity, relying on your intelligence and instincts, your wiles and resourcefulness, your discerning judgment and redoubtable spirit. To the extent you can, let hopefulness dominate and happiness prevail, and allow yourself to feel real joy. Take your blissful moments where you can find them and as much as you are able to, let your soul sing and your light shine. Mastering the art and science of living well requires distinguishing between the different versions of yourself and choosing the best of who you are to fit the story you want to tell. Whether you know it or not, you have been equipped with all the built-in, raw material you need – the exact, right mind, body, and spirit to make your story memorable in all the good ways. In the end, it’s up to you to work with what you’ve got and make the most out of it, turning it into perfection and grace. And the easiest and most rewarding way to achieve that goal is to follow the recipe for living life as the Best Version of You.