During evaluating the various priorities of listing things, I began to think about our daily lives and how we go about doing the things we do. I imagine for most of us, a great deal of things we do just kind of happen. Some things are simply mandatory and must be done. But outside of those two considerations, do we look at how we value doing certain things and choose to do the ones we value most? In all honesty, are we careful about how we use our time and about how we make the choices we make?
I was talking with a friend about how we just couldn't get together. We both can get quite busy and I realized what I think is a truth of sorts; we make time for the things which are important to us or are the things we value most. Apparently we valued each other less than the things that kept us too busy to get together. If that was not true, we would find the time. There is nothing wrong with that and it does help us understand how important we are to one another. Some people we know and are close to and we would drop anything to spend time with them. Others may be good friends that we make a good effort to spend time with and still others may fall more into the acquaintance bracket or casual friend category.
Maybe we could be more deliberate about how we choose what we do and who we do it with. The point I am attempting to make is to value and cherish those things and those whom we love and who are important to us. All too often, we let the drudgery and chores of life take the place of spending time with the people and things who mean so much to us. From my own personal experience, we can let cutting the grass, painting a room, watching a television program or similar things take the time we could spend with people we care about. I can offer several situations where I have been trying to do something fun with a friend/friends but years, yes, years go by and we never see each other. Sometimes, we can let months and years go by without even talking with them. How is it we consider each other as friends but don't even talk? How is it we can think of some people as very important yet never spend a minute together as the months and years pass by? How important are the people who we tell are important to us made to feel by the lack of effort we may display in trying to spend time with them?
We have all been given special friendships and relationships with people we really love to share life with but all too often choices are made to do less valuable things that separate us and those relationships eventually disappear. That is sad and I have experienced such situations a few times in the last couple years. It seems we have learned to let life live us instead of us living life. Being a sand and surf kind of guy, it is not a big stretch for you to hear me say I have found wisdom in a song by Jimmy Buffett. I have found some applicable words to address such situations as he sings, "I'd rather die while I'm living than live while I'm dead."
I think of that phrase often and try to check myself to see if I am settling to live while I'm dead. To me, that means to live a life of meaningless things. It means to live a life in which I might be walking around, not really alive but numb and dead to the exciting, important and valuable things of life. I, too, would rather live a life filled with excitement and meaningful, loving relationships and adventures. I also am a Peter Pan fan! Which explains my need for adventure.
As I have gotten older, I have seen I have too often traded the adventure of being alive for the common, ordinary, hum drum of living while I am dead. More than that, I have let the excitement of sharing life with those who are important to me fade and I regret that. Sometimes I am the one who has to keep making the effort but is that so bad? Is it really so bad to be the one who always calls if a friendship grows and is nurtured?
Let's not make bad trades costing us wonderful memories. Let's not let things at the bottom of a list take the place of the things at the top of the list. I believe I need to make more of an effort to kindle relationships and create fond memories with people who mean the world to me. And who knows, by making an effort, one might even find a great adventure coming from the determination.