This Is It.

Yesterday is over, and tomorrow is not guaranteed.  All we have is now, so we better change our attitude and enjoy it.

Wow.  I was once again reminded tonight of a very important lesson.  One I know all too well.  One I try to live out every day.  And one I often preach to others.  Yet one that momentarily escaped me.

This is it.

2014 began a little rough for me.  Mostly because of my own expectations and reactions to what's going on around me. Things and ideas that are completely out of my control.  I became focused on the negatives; what wasn't happening, who wasn't there for me.  I was focused on what was going wrong in the world, instead of believing in the goodness of life and people.  I wasn't looking at all the positives and those people that actually were there for me.

Last weekend in church (my husband and I found an amazing spiritual group that is open and accepting of all religions and people...we love it!), the main message was about life, and remembering that this moment is all we have.  It was very powerful to me because of the place my mind had wandered to these past couple of weeks.

Yet here I was, again tonight, reliving a lesson I had just been reminded of.

After putting Nya to bed, I sat down to write a blog that I have been working on and researching for the past two months.  I had  talked with numerous health professionals, documented and graphed my research, and compared and contrasted different alternatives.  All that was left was to put the puzzle pieces together and fill in the gaps.

As I sat down and began writing, I went to pull up all of my research... Only to discover that it's GONE.

I wanted to cry.  My first thought was calm, This can't be right.  It's got to be here somewhere.

Yet as I searched, panic began to set it, Where is it?!?

When my husband could not find any of the work, and somehow managed to lose additional work, I had moved well beyond panic to anger, frustration, and despair.  I spent so much time... How did this happen?!?

I felt a little lost and sat here, staring at the computer screen, wallowing in self pity. What now?   I called my mom for advice and a brief pep talk, and she reminded me of my beliefs and the lesson I had just learned.

Life is this moment.  Here and now.  What's done is done, and I can't get it back.  What happens five minutes from now is not promised.  This is it.  This moment, right now.  So how do I want to spend it?

I quickly recovered from my utter panic and frustration; instead focusing on what I try to be mindful of every day.  Instead of blogging about what I was intending, I blogged about life.  I blogged about this moment.  It was an important lesson that I had not anticipated, but one that I obviously was in need of relearning: Life isn't waiting to happen.  It's happening now.  This is it.

"Life is available only in the present."  ~ Thich Nhat Hanh

"Wherever you are, be there. If you can be fully present now, you’ll know what it means to live."   

~ Steve Goodier

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