In my last post, I talked about the Anticipation of our trip to Italy. Today I talk about the reality of the trip and how it compares to life. All I can say is that it was worth every minute of preparation and then execution. We saw some amazing things and though the trip to and from was long and there were days we walked for hours, I would venture to say that it was one of the best trips I have ever been on to date.
The anticipation and the preparation just made it that much better. The planned tours we had in Milan, Rome and Florence were great. They took us to the famous places and explained history and interesting facts (Italy Trip 2016). For those non tour days, I had prepared suggestions of places to visit or things to do and we did several of those, but not all. There were days we decided to do something different, but we never had a day that we didn’t have something to do and see. There were a number of times that Kelly (Tonya’s friend) said that we had a well planned trip. In the end, I believe it was a very successful trip because of the preparation we did before leaving.
Once I decided to go to Italy and I purchased the airfare, condos and car, I could have stopped there. But I feel the trip would have been less successful without all the preparation I put in after the purchase and before the start of the trip. I would not have had any expectations and would have been scrambling to do all the things that we did. The 25 day Italy trip did not happen all at once, it was nine months of planning, then it was 25 day trips. As I look back, I refer to our Italian trip as a whole, but in reality, it was made one day at a time.
And so it is with life. We can say, “I am going to accomplish this!”, but if we just sit and wait for it to happen, the odds are high that nothing will ever happen. We need to plan, set goals and expectations, prepare, and then each day do what needs to be done. It doesn’t happen all at once, but day by day we accomplish. Our lives are made up of single day adventures, successes and failures. Each day brings new opportunities for growth. Each day brings joy and sorrow. Each day is a building block to our life’s success. I like the quote by Benjamin Franklin, “If you fail to plan, you are planning to fail!”
I believe life without a plan, is life without direction and with no direction, you have no destination. To achieve anything in this life, we need to plan and then put that plan in motion. No matter how great or small the desired goal, the planning will direct us to the desired success. This trip was a prime example of a plan for success. We performed most of the items on the plan. We varied some of the items based on new knowledge discovered while there. In the end, we saw, we experience and we enjoyed. I hope we all find the life success we seek, by making a life plan and then executing that plan each day of our life. Then later in life, we can look back and say, “What a great life I have lived!”
No Regrets, only growth!!!