Welcome to the Buddhist Boot Camp Podcast. Our intention is to awaken, enrich, and inspire a simple and uncomplicated life.

Discover the benefits of mindful living with your host, Timber Hawkeye.

The problem with being goal-oriented and future-focused is that at no given point are you ever where you want to be. There's always an underlying farther, higher, better, bigger, faster, more goal, just out of reach,

keeping us focused on what we don't have or how much farther we still have to go,

rather than grateful for how far we've already come and appreciative of the abundance presently

existing in our lives.

Many people have anxiety and panic attacks,

habitually imagining worst-case scenario outcomes,

and constant fear or worry of all the things that could go wrong.

It's been said that anxiety is caused by living in the future

and happiness is only available if we remain fully present with what's right in front of us, neither carrying the weight of the

past that's already gone nor concerned with some imaginary projected unfolding of

events in the future that may or may not turn out the way we fear or hope they would.

It's very possible to remain motivated, driven, and determined without any attachment to an end result.

The distinction is where we place our focus. For example, the highlight of my

volleyball playing days has nothing to do with any tournaments or trophies won. It has

everything to do with the fact that I got to play volleyball every single day.

If my focus at the time was on winning, then the disappointment of losing would be unbearable,

and the drive to then compete again and again and

again would never be satisfied. There would always be another team to beat,

another tournament in which to compete, and another medal to win. But when the focus is on the joy of

playing, not just in hindsight but in the moment, then none of that matters.

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