When we realize that everything offers a clue to our construct, life becomes a cornucopia of delight and learning. It’s the greatest adventure of all, and it’s all beautiful.

I was eighteen years old when I first discovered what some refer to as Eastern philosophy. I had chanced upon a book called The First and Last Freedom by the Indian teacher J. Krishnamurti. He shared a vision and an orientation that upended my insular world and transformed how I saw myself and everything else.

It all made perfect sense: We are energetic beings within an interconnected cosmic web of energy. And yet we are also physical beings, limited by our perceptions and predilections — prisoners of our egos, our illusions and our preconditioning. The goal was to let go and let in. To loosen our death grip on our beliefs, to let go of the biases that limit and strangle us… and to open up to the energy, understanding, and love that could now flow more freely.

But there was one particular concept that didn’t make complete sense at the time. Krishnamurti suggested that beautiful and ugly were essentially the same thing – that it was all good.

As I traveled through life, built a business, fostered a family, and grew as an individual, I would periodically wonder about this notion. And then one day I finally got it:

The world that we perceive is quite literally a reflection of our mind. And anything that helps us to better understand and elevate our mind is valuable.

Our experience of life is a function of how we’re feeling, what we’re focusing on, and how we define those situations. And it’s all arbitrary! Of particular note is that we get to decide both what to focus on and how to frame it.

We get to choose whether we focus on the supposed good or the bad, the happy or the sad, the threat or the opportunity. Note that the most important variable here is not that thing out there, but us in here. Growth and understanding come from appreciating what we choose to focus on, how we choose to frame it… and WHY?

Is something beautiful or ugly? Is it beneficial or bad? And why? Is some recent event a situation to bemoan, or an opportunity to learn from and leverage? Is it another reason why life sucks, or is it a lesson that the universe is laying at our feet?

The biggest variable is us. Therefore — and here’s why my mind finally lit up– the more that we can understand what makes us tick, the more we can let go of unnecessary constraints and augment that which brings us joy.

Beautiful and ugly are meanings that we ascribe to things. And it’s all contrived. And while it can be fun to explore the nuances of whisky or wine or Winslow Homer, we should never let it define or confine or diminish us.

Instead, we can seize the opportunity to constantly appreciate the interaction between us and everything… and to learn and grow and delight in every single experience. Beautiful and ugly are just labels. And how we choose to ascribe those labels offers valuable insights into our soul and psyche.

This appreciation literally changed my world. Everything is now something to experience, savor, learn from, and appreciate. Granted, I still get sucked in and caught up with this or that. But that too becomes something to appreciate and learn from. What happened? Why am I reacting this way? What can I learn about myself from it? How can I grow and become more happy because of it?

One of my favorite mottos is this: Turn Frustration into Fascination! By choosing to focus on what we have to learn, we do learn. And we also grow. It certainly makes for a more wonderful world. A world of light, and love, and opportunity, and wonderment. A world where everything can be beautiful, and everything becomes one big feast.

For more information on this and related topics, read the chapter entitled “The World is a Mirror of Our Mind” in Elevate.