Life is a Buffet; Not a Dine-In!
A few days ago I woke up in the morning with the phrase "Life is a Buffet; not a Dine-In!" running through my mind, like an old song! It was my birthday, and since I believe in 'intuition' (that is messages coming from the Universal Mind), I took it as a sign and decided to write this post.
As you would know from my earlier posts, I am always looking out for simple and fitting analogies for Life and the World, such as: "Life as a Process of Learning", "the World as a University", etc. So this idea of "Life being a Buffet" sounded good to me! It is expanded on below.
On Life being like a Buffet:
A buffet consists of an assortment of food spread out on a huge table! You pay only Once to have the right to help yourself to Everything you choose, Several Times, within the allotted time limit, of say a few hours.
Isn't Life the same? Being born into this world, is like being given that buffet Ticket! From then on, until it is time for us to leave this world (our allotted time), we are able to repeatedly choose the experiences we want!
Sometimes we may end up with experiences that we don't want - just like finding some of the dishes on our plate not to our taste!
But we can always go back to the buffet spread, and choose again something different! Similarly, in life, we can try different courses of action repeatedly, until we die.
Everyday is a new beginning, when you can make a different choice. But we don't realize this and end up waiting to be given new experiences in the world.
On Waiting to be Served at a Dine-In:
Most of us (including me) behave as though we are at a dine-in restaurant, always waiting for our food to be served by others! We often forget that 'Life is like a buffet' and self-service is what is needed!
For decades I have been doing this very thing - procrastinating, waiting for the right time, seeing fortune-tellers, praying for help from higher powers, etc. Thus, I found it difficult to start anything new that I really wanted to do!
By giving up my right to choose, and wasting my time waiting, I end up being frustrated, like the guy in the picture below:
Thus, so much of Life (as I wanted it to be) eluded me, and I ended up looking for something or someone to blame my failures on!
Then, about ten years ago, after a near-death experience (on a three hour ride in an old ambulance, on really bumpy roads), to a hospital in Bintulu, Sarawak, I realized this great truth:
That it is I myself, who must choose to create my own reality! I cannot blame fate, nor my family, nor my friends; not even my enemies, not my karma, and definitely not GOD!
We don't realize that 'Life is indeed a buffet and not a dine-in'; and that we can choose, over and over again what experiences we desire! The 'buffet ticket' of Life is valid until we die! GOD has already provided the spread! All we need to do is to walk up to the table and choose what we want to place on our own plate! We don't realize this because we have never been taught that this is the way life works! Imagine the following scenario:
A First Ever Experience of a Hotel Buffet
A single mother has struggled at various odd-jobs for years to bring up a son, who has finally become a successful business man. For his mother's birthday the son takes her to an expensive hotel to enjoy a nice buffet dinner. He tells his mother to go up to the buffet table and help herself to anything she likes.
The poor mother has never been to an expensive hotel in her life and does not know what a buffet is. Even though her son tells her to help herself to anything, she is still very careful when choosing her food.
She worries that her son would be charged too much, depending on what she chooses. She dare not go for second helpings, etc., because that is how her whole life has been conditioned!
When it comes to making new choices in life, our situation is the same as that poor mother. Over centuries of false teachings, we believe that Life and this World are generally against us! The truth however, is that the World is not against us or for us - the World is Neutral!
That spread on the buffet table, is there for anyone to choose from. GOD does not forbid it for some and permit it for others! If you have been born, then you have the right to choose your experiences!
But we think we must wait for permission from others (the bosses, family, colleagues, god etc.) before we can make our decision, to Live the life we really want.
Waiting for permission to do what we really desire to do and staying in unhappy situations, just because we are afraid to leave our comfort zone, does not produce success or happiness, only misery and frustration! I can attest to that by my decades of waiting for things to be just right.
Things will never be perfect. We just have to start doing what we really dream of, and then nature will show us the next steps to take.
The above quote by Maxwell Maltz is true for technology as well as for your mind! Your inbuilt guidance system can only begin to function once you are moving forwards, not when standing still!
It is only when you begin moving towards a target, that the feedback loop can show you, how far off-target you are, and then help you to get back on-target!
So, when it comes to living, remember that Life is a Buffet, and stop waiting to be served. You are not at a Dine-In.