“You must live in the present, launch yourself on every wave, find your eternity in each moment. Fools stand on their island of opportunities and look to another land. There is no other land; there is no other life but this.”
~ Henry David Thoreau
It’s easy to forget what a blessing this one day, this one moment is. But everything you are experiencing today is never going to come about again. If you have children, they are growing and changing right before your eyes. Music and fashion are changing and evolving.
And you are changing too.
It’s so tempting to look to the future and imagine that it will be better than today. In some distant land, some distant future, we think we will have enough – enough money, enough love, enough leisure. Maybe even enough happiness.
But what if that day never comes? What if this is as good as it gets?
What if all the blessings you are ever going to get are already in your possession?
An even more sobering thought is this:
What if everything you have today were all about to be taken from you as soon as tomorrow – your health, your security, your loved ones? What you would yearn for then would be to have exactly what you have today.
You are surrounded by little blessings you take for granted, and every one of them will be yours only for a short time. It’s such a human tendency to not realize how good you have it until the blessings you have are lost.
It doesn’t have to be that way. It’s time to embrace and truly appreciate the magic and beauty and uniqueness of this one moment in time.
Keeping Things in Perspective
A friend of mine at one time was a branch manager at a bank when she was diagnosed with breast cancer. Once a person hears the word “cancer” everything changes. Everything you once thought mattered suddenly isn’t all that important. My friend told me that one day two of her staff members were arguing about whether the shades on the window should be up or down. Since she was the manager, they wanted her to make the decision. She looked at them blankly and said, “It really doesn’t matter to me. I have bigger things to worry about, like whether I’m going to live or not.”
Whether or not you are facing a health crisis or any other kind of crisis in your life at this time, keep things in perspective. Don’t let the little things become more important than appreciating this one moment and the things and people that fill your life, things and people you should be cherishing.
This moment in time is a very precious gift. Don’t waste it wishing for things you may never get, or yearning for things to happen that may never happen.
Remember the words of Walt Whitman, which are “Happiness, not in another place but this place….not for another hour, but this hour.”
Don’t wait to be happy. This minute and this hour are worth cherishing.
