Don’t Let This Happen!

Enjoy life to the full!

What if you woke up one day and you’re 65, or 75, and you never got your memoir or novel written; or you didn’t go swimming in warm pools and oceans all those years because your thighs were jiggly and you had a nice big comfortable tummy; or you were just so strung-out on perfectionism and people-pleasing that you forgot to have a big juicy creative life, of imagination and radical silliness and staring off into space like when you were a kid? It’s going to break your heart. Don’t let this happen!  Anne Lamott

Every now and then you run across a quote that jumps out, grabs you by the shoulders and shakes you into paying attention. This one did just that.  

Stuck in a rut

I am by nature cautious and reserved. I suppose the more adventurous might accuse me of being boring, or at least timid and under-enthusiastic. Actually, I have done plenty of adventurous things in my life, including scuba diving, white-water rafting, hiking in slot canyons and spelunking (I mean the kind where you squirm through dark, muddy holes on your belly. Great fun, actually.) But it is much too easy to plod along in my happy little (predictable, humdrum, unimaginative) rut–exactly the kind of life Anne’s quote is warning us not to live.

So I need to be very intentional about breaking out of my normal routine, paying more attention to the wonder and beauty around me, and making an effort to discover  new, interesting activities. Perhaps you feel the same way?

An example

Recently an acquaintance visited out house for the first time. After stepping out onto our back deck (which in the summertime seems more like a tree house) she said that she would love to start her mornings there. This caught me by surprise.  For some reason, it had never occurred to me that the deck might be a nice place to sit in the morning, to enjoy breakfast and some quiet reading. That is going to change! I have vowed to spend more time on my deck this summer.  Already my deck-time has produced benefits: I watched an adolescent hawk flap awkwardly from branch to branch, and just yesterday I enjoyed the brilliant red of a Scarlet Tanager. (If you’ve never seen one, a Scarlet Tanager makes a Cardinal look dull.)

As I proceed with my summer, I hope to grab other serendipitous opportunities rather than opt out because it might be too cold, or too hot, or too muddy, or too inconvenient, or …

Accountability

So, all of you out there who know me, I hereby give you permission to ask me how I’m doing. Find out when I last grabbed life instead of letting life pass on by. Ask when I last sat on the deck and appreciated the beautiful spot I call home. Because I know it will take more than a quote and a blog post to keep me on the right track. My goal is to live the life I’ve been given to the full, but many days I fail to come close because staying in my rut takes less energy and often makes for a less bumpy ride. It’s never too late to change, but I won’t succeed without help.

At the end of the movie Secondhand Lions, Walter says of his uncles, “Yeah, they really lived.” That is the kind of life Anne Lamott’s quote is calling us to.  I want to look back and say, “Yeah, I really lived.”

How about you?