In a moment of reflection today, I could not help but swallow the sadness that the warmth of summer passed as quickly as it came. In a few short weeks, the season of changing leaves, jack-o’-lanterns, and crisp cool air will fill the New England landscape.
However, I am just not ready for it.
After all, there’s a lot of living left to do, a lot of things to check off the bucket list before the fall routine comes back in full force. There’s the picnic that needs to be planned, the national park I had promised to visit, the beach that needs to be explored, and the list goes on.
A successful entrepreneur once taught me that in order to embrace the different “seasons” in life, one has to start living life as it’s meant to be lived and not merely just exist. This meant moving out of our own comfort zone, embracing spontaneity, and actively and fully participating in life, be it traveling, working, studying, volunteering, being with family and friends, etc. To exist, however, is to go through the rhythms of daily life passively and without a lot of joy and excitement. Sounds pretty stale to me.
The takeaway lesson from all this is to live the moments, to explore with an open mind, to not need another person’s permission or approval, to let go of the mundane, to embrace all possibilities.
Two winters ago, I endured a home renovation project that was meant to be small in scale and to be completed in a week’s time. It eventually became a full-blown, major scale job that took over a month to complete. It was a period of unprecedented chaos but throughout this “hiccup,” what gave me strength was focusing on the project’s beautiful outcome rather than dwelling on the ugly stuff. It also meant accepting that my office would need to be set up temporarily elsewhere (even at the library!), having a snowball fight with my child while in the middle of priming and painting the living room walls, and taking an afternoon off to head to a dressing room at Macy’s to make funny faces in the mirror.
This is what living the moments should be all about.
Image credit: Susan Ho
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