Planning Ahead
From Google Calendars, Black Berry’s to Outlook Expresses Calendar we are a culture of steady planning. Nothing wrong with that whatsoever. Yet, the trend of planning and not living is starting to take over. We are so worried about making sure we know what is going on next weekend we are missing out the time we are spending together THIS weekend.
We are all guilty of it. Next weekend you have a wedding to attend so, if you are anything like me, wait till the weekend before hand and drive down to Target hoping something inexpensive is still available in their register. The next two hours are then me running up and down every isle there trying to find 3B. Which is actually quite sad because as a teen I used to work at a Target.
Nonetheless my Saturday is spent traveling from Target to Target trying to hunt down a gift and then planning for the trip for the next weekend. Now, in all actuality I am on of the type of individuals who can plan anything ahead of time yet birthdays/weddings/anniversaries seem to throw me for a loop. No clue why. That is not important right now though.
The point of the illustration is we are so wrapped up preparing for the next big thing that we are missing out on the little things with our family. One of the most fun things I have done with my family is go to what has been deemed as “Fish Park” whey they have some Koi Fish to the length of 2.4 feet (even larger) and turtles to match. What we do is go there for an hour or so and feed them along with any ducks that might be there. One of the most funny things that occurs is walking along the bank with my son in hand and looking at the pond and seeing literally two dozen fish’s and turtles swimming next to us.
While that might be something little to do before an afternoon nap or before going out to dinner it is one of the things I look forward to. Even more so when it is nice outside. It is these little things that we make our memories which we can look back and say we spent some real quality time with our family.
Again, my challenge to you all (as well as myself) is to quit trying to plan everything. Enjoy life. Don’t just enjoy the sunshine for once watch a rain storm. My dad used to study lighting, don’t ask, so we’d have some amazing pictures of lightining striks around our house. I remember growing up we had a built out portch where we would watch lightening storms. It was calming and truly amazing to see how the sky would light up with each strike.
