Tending Your Garden: Focus On What You Can Control

When you realize that happiness is a choice, you tend to focus on what you can control, rather than allowing yourself to be controlled by external forces.

But what exactly are the things within your control?

Life is full of uncertainties and events beyond our control…

The sad part is, many of us fall into the trap of trying to control the uncontrollable, only to end up feeling more helpless and unhappy.

It's a common struggle, but there's a better way to navigate life's challenges…

Knowing What You Can Control

Imagine you're a gardener, nurturing your plants with care…

You water them, protect them from pests, and ensure they get enough sunlight.

However, despite your efforts, a sudden storm can sweep in and damage your garden.

If you obsess over the unpredictable weather, trying to shield your plants from every potential harm, you'll only wear yourself out.

Instead, successful gardeners focus on what they can control—their gardening techniques and the care they provide.

They understand that while they can't stop the storm, they can strengthen their plants to withstand it.

Same thing happens in life…

Instead of focusing on what you can’t control, such as what other people say or do, you must only pay attention to the one thing you have absolute control over…

Your actions and behavior.

You must surrender the outcome because the outcome is outside of your control…

And you must accept you can’t control everything.

But where do you start?

How to Focus on What You Can Control

Here are 5 tips to help you apply this philosophy to your life:

1. Focus on Your Actions:
   Just like a gardener focuses on tending their garden, concentrate on your own behavior and choices.
   These are the seeds you can plant and nurture.

2. Accept What You Can't Control:
   Acknowledge that some things, like other people's actions or life's unexpected events, are like the weather—beyond your control.

3. Adapt and Respond:
   When challenges arise, adapt your strategies and responses, much like a gardener adjusts their care based on the garden's needs.

4. Find Peace in Surrender:
   Surrendering control over external factors doesn't mean giving up.
   It means finding peace in focusing on what you can influence.

5. Cultivate Resilience:
   Just as a well-tended garden can weather a storm, building resilience helps you navigate life's uncertainties with grace.

Instead of worrying about what you cannot control, shift your energy to what you can create. -Roy T. Bennett

By embracing the lesson of the gardener, we can learn to focus on our own circle of control.

It's about nurturing our actions and attitudes and letting go of the need to control the uncontrollable.

In doing so, we can find a sense of peace and empowerment, knowing that while we can't predict every storm, we can prepare ourselves to face them with strength and resilience.

So, tend to your garden of life with care, and watch it flourish in the face of life's unpredictable weather.

Conclusion: Surrender to Self-Mastery

You’re the architect of your life.

The life you create is an inner journey that reflects outward, and the quality of your life is determined by the focus of your thinking.

So when you consider that, what you don’t control controls you, you’ll realize that what is realistically within your control is your own thoughts, feelings, words, habits, and behaviors.

Nothing else.

This is why self-mastery is the ultimate secret to success, happiness, and wealth.

You are challenged every day to focus on what you can control in ways you may not even realize.

Responses that come ‘naturally’ to you are programmed behaviors based on your experiences as well as your desired outcomes.

In some situations, you might have the urge to run, freeze, or explode in a rage.

In others, you may feel like you could stay in that moment forever because it brings out the best in you.

This is another key to consider… time.

The only place you have any power is in the present moment because NOW is the only moment that is real.

Sure it’s helpful to reflect and plan ahead…

But since you can’t realistically ‘wave your hand’ yesterday or tomorrow, knowing that NOW is the only time you can ‘wave your hand’ supports the statement that the present is a powerful gift.

With so much going on around you, how will you allow those things to impact your energy, thoughts and actions?

What do you gain by giving your power away to things you have no control over, that extort your life force and creative capacity, or hold it ransom?

And what kind of future are you programming your reality for when, in the present moment, you choose to stress over things you can’t control?

Consider these questions so you can surrender to the flow of consistent, and truly connected happiness, and to stress less about what’s beyond your control in life’s deep waters.

Remember, what you focus on expands.

If you focus on fear, it becomes your master.

Then you may want to learn how to tame the fear to create better balance in your life.

If you focus on the resources or skills you don’t have yet, you simply create more lack, when instead you could be using your time and energy to bridge the gaps.

If you focus on everything and everyone else outside of yourself, you give your power away to others.

But if you focus on what you can control, then you are embracing your own power in each moment.

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Frequently Asked Questions About How to Focus on What You Can Control

Has your Mind ever wondered…

Why should you only focus on what you can control?

It makes sense to focus on what you can control simply because focusing on anything else is a waste of time, energy, and talent.

You can program your life for success or failure.

By focusing on the things you do have control over, you are being actively involved in how your life events unfold as you place conscious attention on them.

By focusing on what you have no control over, you keep yourself locked in the past or in anticipation of a future that might never happen.

How to focus on what you can control instead of what you cannot?

The key to this is prioritizing your happiness.

Everything is energy, and energy can’t be created or destroyed, only transformed.

Therefore self-awareness and self-care are crucial in how you manage your own energy.

The things in your control all come from within you.

By controlling yourself, your thoughts, words, and actions, as well as your other resources, you learn to accept that there are things you can’t control.

And, in so doing you place the focus on what you can control by adapting, responding with reason, and surrendering to the natural flow of energy.

Why do I struggle to control myself?

Our mental conditioning plays a great role here.

We’re expected to exercise self-control, but not adequately taught how to do so, especially in the most critical times of development.

You can start practicing it now by using the 5 tips mentioned in this post to learn how to focus on the only thing you really can control…

Just You.