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Tuesday, July 12, 2011

perspective

My friend Ange told me yesterday that she knows the man who sells (really awesome) goat cheese at the farmer's market. He is 10+ year cancer survivor.

Ange says if you ask him how he is, he always answers, "Today is the best day of my life."

I want to get me some of that feeling.
I'm reading a book right now (Promises to Keep) about a mom who finds out, after beating breast cancer already, that she only has 6-12 months to live. 


I know, I know, it is only fiction but fiction is powerful only when it is steeped in realism. I am heartbroken and moved and humbled and grateful.  It begs the question: what if this was me?  It makes me want to only use kind words, never get frustrated by time delays, bad drivers, long lines and whining children. I want only to have loving, positive interactions with my children and the people I love. I want to appreciate EVERYTHING.

I want to not need a death sentence to live my life as if each one could be my last. Not with morbidity but with presence, full awakeness and joy for all the small moments. 

This is not an entirely new want for me. In fact, I've been working to cultivate this for some time at a success rate of maybe 5% per year improvement.  Occasionally, like now, the urgent need to enjoy my life right now becomes overwhelming.

Urgent need.  Sounds like serenity, no?

I guess you can't fight your personality so I'm trying to just go with it.  My mantra today:  this is the best day of my life. 

And my second mantra (since I am, after all, a girl who always has a back up plan):  you never step in the same river twice.  (Translation: my life will never again be exactly like this precise moment so I'd better relish it.)

So now I go on to find beauty in the small things, breath into the mundane and attempt to find presence when the you-know-what hits the fan.

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