By Peter Adams                                                                             
Author of VisualFestation                                                               
www.VisualFestation.com 

My Wife and I love to go to a local restaurant which has excellent Mexican food.  We have been dining at this restaurant for roughly four years.  One of our favorite dishes to order off of the menu is “Mexican Egg Rolls”.  We first saw these ordered by another patron years ago, and they were so big that we had to ask what dish it was.  The lady who ordered them said that they were amazing and it was her favorite dish.  

The Mexican Egg Rolls is a delicacy made out of shredded chicken, cheddar cheese, and sliced jalapeños peppers which are wrapped in a tortilla and deep fried.  The restaurant likes to use jalapeños which are really hot, so we typically remove them, but we often times don’t find them all until it is too late.  

Last week we were sitting near to the Owners of the restaurant and when we commented about how much we liked their food, especially the Mexican Egg Rolls.  We also said we try to avoid eating the jalapeños, and how often times missed one forcing us to drink a full glass of ice water.

The Owners of the restaurant then told us to just order them and tell the waitress to “hold” the jalapeños.  They said that the dish was made to order and that you could also mix and match the ingredients.  We were in shock, as we had always “assumed” that they were a packaged dish that was from a vendor.
 
How many times in our lives do we settle for not living the life of our dreams, but instead make assumptions that we cannot for whatever reason.  In the example above, it never occurred to us that we could have the dish exactly the way we wanted it.  The whole time we settled for digging out the jalapeños, when all we had to do was ask and we could have had them the exact way we wanted them.
 
There is nothing you cannot Be, Do, or Have.  Get clear on what you want.  If your life is giving you jalapeños and you don’t like it, change your order and ask for what it is that you want.  

A good friend once advised “go where the love is”.  In other words, we all affect each other for better or for worse.  Just like what we ingest can affect the way we feel, the same is true for whom we spend our time with.  When we are surrounded by angry, negative people, we can end up feeling the same way.  When we spend time with inspiring, positive people, we end up feeling great.  Ask yourself whom you interact with on a daily basis. Of course some of this is out of our control, for example, in work situations, at the grocery store, etc.  Outside of these situations, who is in your life? Who are the people you text, call, or email?  What do you talk about with these people?  What do they want to talk about? The first step is awareness. Be aware of where you are choosing to put your energy, and who is involved with that.  Once you’re aware, you can make decisions on if it makes sense to continue as-is or make some tweaks.  Do you have any related experiences you would like to share? We’d love to hear from you!