Happy New Year, Everyone! I’m back in the blogosphere!
2014 came to a nice close filled with lots of family & events. I apologize for not posting about it, but no fear, I will in the upcoming weeks! For today, though, I just wanted to share my 2015 vision: continue to live by being happy and accepting what comes my way.
Learning to Live Today:
With every passing year, it’s becoming clearer to me that no two days will ever have the same environment nor experience. And, with each passing year, I see clearer that life around me (not only mine, but my family/friends’, too) is changing. There are weddings, babies, losing loved ones, moving to a new neighborhood, sickness, etc. etc. Which is natural, because it’s all part of life, right? Right.
So with all of this change and the opportunity to live in the moment, why shouldn’t we just live in the moment? We all may have a vision of the perfect way things should go in our heads, but when they don’t go as we have planned them to, we get frustrated and it’s at that moment that we don’t truly live and enjoy ourselves; we aren’t allowing ourselves to be happy.
We shouldn’t try to just live when things are up to our ‘perfect’ standards. Why should we wait for the stars to align to finally let go and be happy? Will I really finally enjoy myself at the pool when I’m 15 lbs. lighter? Will I really wait years to finally host a dinner because I can’t afford that big house I’ve been dreaming of right now? Or will I just take what I’m given, live in that moment and make amazing memories today that will last a lifetime?
Every year in January,
Ah, ease.
I’ve been feeling a bit more appreciative and less anxious these past couple of days – and it feels amazing. A lot of hard work has been (and is still) put in and the benefits have just been that much more rewarding.
Part of me staying at ease has been me trying to be around nature as much as I can (walking in parks, sitting outside in our little garden, etc.); it has a mysterious way of snapping me out of societal ‘pressures’ and bringing me back to the roots of ‘life’, making me really appreciate the air we breathe and the natural, non-obtrusive beauty this world beholds. Living and working in NYC (or any other big city at that) makes ‘being one with nature’ a little more challenging. Sadly, sometimes the next best thing to an escape that I can get to around here is standing next to a tree on the busy streets- and that’s if I can find one! It becomes even more of a challenge considering we only get summer weather that all but a few weeks out here!
So in honor of inching a little closer to ‘nature’ and appreciating it with a much calmer mind, my husband and I set off for the day to Port Jefferson, Long Island. It was actually half a day, but I was determined to use all of my senses and really live in the moment.
Now, I think the last time I was at Port Jefferson was about two or three years ago. I can’t really even recall what I did out there because I took it for granted.
But that wasn’t going to happen this time. I made sure to make my visit a memorable one and not let it be another blur, especially since I feel like I went out there with a ‘new pair of eyes’ and a, truly, ‘open mind’.
As I watched the water fountains splash water into the air, I couldn’t help but be happy. I turned to my husband and told him:
“It’s weird; I deeply appreciate the life around me. I am crying because I can feel the wind on my face, I can hear the splashes of water crash back down into the fountain and I notice the leaves dancing with the direction of the wind on the trees. I think the reason why I appreciate this so much is because I can finally appreciate stillness. I am just so happy; this is a taste of what I have been working so hard for and it’s slowly arriving. I love it, I feel so blessed.”
In a world where there are a lot of fast-paced decisions, dinners, and footsteps, it becomes very hard to appreciate the little things sometimes. I told him that if this was me a year ago, I wouldn’t have been able to just sit there and enjoy my surroundings. I would have just been thinking about the 101 things I needed to do and 101 things I should have done; I wouldn’t have been appreciating the moment, the present.
As I ate my sandwich I continued to cry because I could taste every bite of my it, I could enjoy the sun peeking through the clouds and warming my cheeks. And all of this was amazingly nice.
It’s such a different feeling and I cry because I appreciate it. I didn’t need my phone to distract me at that moment. I actually didn’t want my phone at all. I secretly wished we were back in the early 1900s, in the countryside, with no technology. Just nature.
