This is an easy one. With the recent miserable events of 2020, how many of us wished for the year to end? In Melbourne, Victoria, Australia, we endured five months of lockdown. We were only allowed out within a five kilometer radius and then only to exercise (one hour per day) or to go shopping. My partner hasn’t been back to the grocery shops since. And we wished for that time to end. Yet, now that time has passed. I’ve thought about whether there is any lasting psychological damage and I don’t think so. 2020 was a little special, but for the most part, try to not wish a second of your precious life away.
It amazes me, going into work on Monday morning and hearing the usual, “I can’t wait for Friday to come”. In the real world, we aren’t dreaming when we wish our lives away like that. This is not a movie where we wake up and get a second chance. Today is not a dress rehearsal. Kasey Chambers sings, “When I grow up, I want a pony” as if in ten years’ time she will be happy.
I remember with the first baby – sleepless nights and endless crying (that was the mother not the child!) People told me that if I could just get through the first six weeks, life would be better. So I wished those weeks away. Life wasn’t much better. “Get through the first 3 months”, I was told. Then it would be much better when the child started kindergarten, primary school then high school. I kept wishing. This year that little baby turns thirty and I now wish that I could turn back the clock. Don’t wish your kids’ lives away. Every day that passes, has passed. Try to live in and enjoy something about every present moment. It is a moment we never can get back.
I understand it is not always easy to enjoy every heartbeat and breath. Especially when you are sitting in the dentist, having a root canal and wishing the chap with his fat fingers down your throat would get on a move on, knowing there is another hour or so of pain to go. Or dreaming about a wonderful holiday booked for eight weeks’ time yet today’s work or school is a grind. If only those eight weeks would hurry up and fly by, then you would be happy, you promise.
Promise me you will try to find something good in every breath. Choose to be happy right now. Unpleasant activities, events and times will come and go. So will the good times. Don’t wish your life away.