
Written by Karen D. Swim
No matter how much I have tried to deny it, August is quickly coming to close. This of course means that we are also coming to the end of the summer. Bummer! In the cold of winter, summer seemed so far away. I had big plans for time away and summer fun. Well, it rained for the first part of the summer and now it’s almost over. I allowed my excuses to get in the way of living and now my “soon” has become “yesterday.”
“Opportunities are like sunrises — if you wait too long, you miss them.”– William Arthur War
How often do we postpone living with a litany of excuses? “As soon as my business hits $X, I’ll take a little break.” “When the kids are older, I will ___________,” “In a couple of months when things are quiet, I will…” “I will…..when I lose 10 pounds, get that promotion, blah, blah, blah!” Yet, all too often soon comes and goes and we are left with a bunch of yesterdays and unfulfilled desires. We all know this but why do we continue to do it? Well, I have witnessed (okay experienced) three reasons.
- We are unyielding in our quest for the ideal. Often we plan for perfection, and are unwilling to settle for anything less. Will the experience be any less fun if it is not perfect? Will a day at the beach spent with family totally suck because you didn’t lose 2 pounds? Well yes if you focus on the size of your thighs rather than the experience itself. Ideal is incredible but so are the imperfect experiences along the way.
- F-E-A-R. Fear! You’re a giant chicken afraid that you will fail. Fear is far more paralyzing than anything that can happen when you try and blow it. If you’re waiting for the fear to magically disappear, you will be waiting till death do you part. The fear does not necessarily go away. You have to embrace it and go for it anyway. This is not to be confused with rational fear. For example you should be very afraid of leaping from a building believing you can fly or standing in front of a moving train. You’ve been warned.
- We have lost control of the bus. It is possible to allow our lives to veer out of balance. We concentrate on one area and neglect others. Before you know it the whole thing has gone off course. You look up in a daze and realize your toddler is asking for the car keys, or the vacation happened but you were not part of it. Hit the brakes, pull over to the side of the road and plot a new course. To prevent this from happening, check in on a regular basis to ensure that you make corrections quickly.
The good news is that if you’re reading this post, you’re still breathing (yay!) and there is still hope! So let’s change our wicked ways together. Life is here and now. I may not be able to jump on a plane and fly to Italy today but there are a host of things that are available to me. My pockets are pretty heavy with yesterdays but thankfully I have today.
And now I’ld love to hear from you. Have you ever been guility of putting off something you wanted? How did you get back on course?