“Live today. Not yesterday. Not tomorrow. Just today. Inhabit your moments. Don’t rent them out to tomorrow.”
Jerry Spinelli
Yesterday I had a great conversation with a trusted mentor and he shared with me an epiphany that he had in the last week about our desire to “get back to normal.” The realization that he shared is that we can spend all our time and energy now trying to get back to once was, without ever thinking through the more important question of “what should be?” We can also spend all our time worrying about what might happen, and comparing our tomorrow’s to the expectations of yesterday.
I really found his thinking to be both provocative and insightful. It caused me to reflect on and think about these verses from the book of Luke.
‘And he said to his disciples, “Therefore I tell you, do not be anxious about your life, what you will eat, nor about your body, what you will put on. For life is more than food, and the body more than clothing. And which of you by being anxious can add a single hour to his span of life? If then you are not able to do as small a thing as that, why are you anxious about the rest? Sell your possessions, and give to the needy. Provide yourselves with moneybags that do not grow old, with a treasure in the heavens that does not fail, where no thief approaches and no moth destroys. For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also.‘ Luke 12:22-23,25-26,33-34
It is so easy to focus on what “we are missing out on RIGHT NOW” instead of reveling in the unique and special gifts of the current moment. It is also so easy to focus so forcefully on the promise of tomorrow that we see past the beauty right in front of us.
We are all experiencing a unique and challenging time, filled with uncertainty, the loss of freedom and disruptive change to almost every aspect of our lives. So many people have been affected in tremendous and tragic ways. It can be hard to see brightness and joy when so much of the conversation is dominated by the bad news and the comparison to “what was” and “what might be.”
If we all aren’t careful we could miss out on the precious gift of each moment that we are alive. We could lose the opportunity to make this current moment different and powerful. We put at risk the opportunity to make a difference and serve others. And that is a treasure that we truly don’t want to give away…
