I used to pride myself…
on always having a thought. Whether a question about the world around me, an idea for a poem, something profound or superficial didn’t matter, I was always thinking about something.
My family makes fun of me because of my need to frequently jot down my thoughts.
However, lately, I have been very aware of the moments between the thoughts.
A slow, hazy, place where suddenly I am without thought. It feels disconcerting, and a little buoyant.
In those places the lessons lie.
Not So Easy
In those moments I am observing. However, I am not observing and analyzing others, I am paying attention to what catches my attention because it is what I need to learn or correct about myself.
It’s easy to fall into a place of judgment.
We look at others and think how easy it would be to stop being so impatient, resentful, angry, negative, weak, and then we are suddenly exactly where they were.
Not so easy.
If and when you find that you are passing judgment on someone, known to you or a perfect stranger, quickly re-direct that energy back on to you.
Other people are there to provide us with our own reflection.
Your Life Is Your Responsibility
Kids are easy. All they want to do is play, and in that play is discovery, revelations, lessons.
Adults are hard. They don’t have time to play. There are too many tasks and obligations to fulfill not to mention figure out their life’s purpose. Then there are jobs, bills, people to feed, chores, errands, etc., on your plate and on your mind.
If you have small children or are in charge of small children, your life is your responsibility. They should not know about your problems. However, kids love it when you include them in “fun” things like chores or errands. Helping you gives them a sense of purpose because in their eyes they are making a difference. And they are. If you let them.
But I’ll tell you with all those adult things on your mind it is a gift that you give to them and to yourself to sit down with them and play.
I digress, I think, Lol.
What Is the Answer?
Is it really necessary to know why you are here on this earth?
We believe only then we will find fulfillment. We imagine a reality where everything has fallen into place and a redolent satisfaction will wash over us.
Some people spend their lives searching for purpose, others never find it, and the ones that seemingly do appear out of reach for everyone else.
So, what is the answer?
There is no answer.
We’ll See
It is not what we accomplish, who we are, or what we look like. Rather, it is that we are here at all.
We are here to experience life. That’s it. You will try your best to determine those experiences, and you will succeed to a certain extent, but life will find you and your perspective will sow the quality of even the worst experiences.
Remember that fable about a farmer whose only horse runs off? Bad luck. Then that horse brings back three new horses. Good luck. Then his son falls off one of those horses and breaks his legs. Bad luck. Then soldiers come through his town to collect all the males for war and the son is left behind because of that broken leg. Good luck.
Through it all the farmers only response was, “We’ll see,” because he knew that life isn’t always what it seems.
So, take things as they come without trying to define and categorize them.
To Live
One of my favorite movies is Secondhand Lions (2003) about a young boy who is sent to live with his bachelor uncles.
I won’t go into the movie, I just wanted to share the last line which has stayed with me all these years.
When the now grown-up nephew is asked by a child if his uncles, because of the stories he has heard, really lived, the nephew responds, “They really lived.” Not that they existed, we all exist, it’s that they weren’t afraid to take part in their own lives wherever that took them.
It was their attitude. Kind of a yes man, why not, hell yah, attitude. Which can occur in your own corner of the world. No need to travel anywhere.
Life is meant to be lived. That includes occasionally stopping everything to make time for play.
“There is no duty which we so much underrate as that of being happy.”
Robert Louis Stevenson
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