A friend of mine used this quote last week and when I asked for the source, she sent me the link to this beautiful blog. This is exactly how I feel about my life… plus I do it all with a latte in my hand and I don’t see any point in going for skim milk.
“I will not die an unlived life. I will not live in fear of falling or catching fire. I choose to inhabit my days, to allow my living to open me, to make me less afraid, more accessible, to loosen my heart until it becomes a wing, a torch, a promise. I choose to risk my significance; to live so that which comes to me as seed goes to the next as blossom and that which comes to me as blossom, goes on as fruit.” —Dawna Markova
My Mother-in-law is from a generation where people lived with plastic over their furniture and lamp shades. She never takes the plastic off of things. She says she’s saving things, but I don’t know who she is always saving things for. There has never been a special guest in the house who has merited the removal of the plastic from the lamp shades and table tops. Never. So when she dies and the house is inherited by her children, they will find all the furnishings unused and brand spanking new… from the 1980s.
I can’t live like that. I like to put pictures of my own loved ones in my picture frames instead of keeping the picts of the department store model families that come with the frames. We actually asked her about this once. She jokingly told us that these people were better looking than all of us, so that’s why she never changes the picture when she buys a new frame. Really I think she is secretly planning to return the frame to the store someday. But I can’t live like my house is a store. I want my life to feel “lived in”.
I try to live life by fully focusing on the beauty of the moment. I don’t always succeed in this since I’m naturally future focused and like things well planned ahead of time. However, this is my goal- live and love this moment. Whether good or bad, stressful or relaxing, I reject guilt and fear which rob me of my joy and thankfulness. I find God in the moment. He’s in the past and future too, but I am only in this moment so I can only connect with Him right now. This living in the moment is so hard for me sometimes, but it’s always good for me. It’s worth doing something that is good and hard when you get the kind of joy that I find in this challenge. I live fully in the now. I will not die an unlived life.
Monkeys in My Bag 