The Life You Keep Walking Past

Inside Nat's Notebook - Real Reflections for Real Change

Have you ever finally got the thing you wanted and been slightly alarmed by how quickly your mind found something else to want?

You spend months looking forward to the holiday. You research it, book it, pay for it, count down to it and tell anybody who asks that you absolutely cannot wait to get away.

Then you arrive. And within an impressively short period of time, you're checking the weather for tomorrow, wondering where you're going for dinner and thinking you really should look at your emails because you'll have a nightmare to come back to 

otherwise.

I mean, seriously. You spent six months trying to get here, and your mind has already left.

We humans are very good at the next thing, right!

There's Always A Next Thing

You see it everywhere once you start looking. You work towards the promotion and, when you get it, there is a wonderful yet short period of celebration before the new job has become your job and you start thinking about where this might lead next. 

You spend weeks working on something, finally finish it and experience that delicious sense of done for approximately eleven minutes and 22 seconds before remembering the other thing you haven't started yet.

You wait all week for Friday. Friday arrives, and suddenly you're organising Saturday. You spend Saturday getting things done so you can enjoy Sunday, and somewhere around Sunday afternoon your mind quietly wanders into Monday and starts preparing for a week that hasn't even begun.

Honestly, it is exhausting, don't you think? It's like a never-ending conveyor belt of “doing”.

Now, I'm not suggesting there's anything wrong with looking forward to things or wondering what comes next. I love having things to look forward to. Anticipation can be half the fun.

What I am looking at here is how quickly we move on. Because sometimes we barely seem to arrive at the thing we were so busy trying to get to before our attention has found the next destination.

Do You Ever Actually Arrive?

Think about the last thing you were really looking forward to. Maybe it was a holiday, seeing someone, finishing a project, getting through an insanely busy week, moving house, going out for dinner or simply reaching the end of a day that felt approximately three days long.

How long did you actually stay there when it arrived?

Not physically. I'm assuming you didn't arrive at dinner and immediately leave. That would be rather disappointing for everyone involved. I mean mentally. Did you experience that tiny moment of Ahhhhh, I'm here? Or did your mind simply move the finish line again?

You tell yourself you'll feel better when this week is over. You'll relax when that piece of work is finished. You'll have more time when things calm down. You'll enjoy yourself when you get away on holiday.

Then the week ends, the work gets finished, things calm down for seventeen minutes, or you finally get away, and somehow you're already thinking about something else. The destination just keeps changing.

Your Mind Is Very Good At Not Being Here

To be fair to your mind, this ability is incredibly useful. You can stand in your kitchen on Tuesday and organise something happening three months from now. You can remember what went wrong last time and use that information to make a better decision today. You can imagine possibilities, anticipate problems and make plans for things that don't exist yet.

Very clever indeed.

It also means you can be brushing your teeth while attending tomorrow's meeting in your head. You can be having Saturday breakfast while thinking about Monday morning. You can finally sit down after a long day and immediately begin mentally organising everything that needs to happen tomorrow.

Your body arrived. Your mind didn't get the memo.

And when you're busy, stressed or used to carrying a lot, this can become such a normal way of moving through life that you barely notice you're doing it. There is always something else requiring thought, planning, sorting, anticipating or remembering, so your attention naturally keeps moving towards whatever comes next.

Which raises the question: What happens to the bit you're in?

The Bit You're In Is Your Life

That's the part I find really interesting. Think about something in your life now that you once desperately wanted. Maybe you wanted the promotion, hoped you'd get the house, dreamed about making the move, worked to build the business, couldn't wait to see more of someone, studied for the qualification or simply wondered whether you'd ever get through a period of life that seemed to go on forever.

Then life moves on, and extraordinary things become familiar surprisingly quickly.

The new job becomes work. The house you couldn't believe was going to be yours becomes the house with the cupboard door that needs fixing. The person you once couldn't wait to see becomes the person you're discussing what needs picking up from the supermarket with.

That doesn't mean any of it has become less valuable. It means you've lived with it long enough for it to become ordinary.

And that's what happens when extraordinary things become ordinary. We stop seeing them in quite the same way. How quickly does I can't wait become what's next? How quickly does something you wanted become something you barely notice you have?

Because maybe some of the life we keep walking past isn't hidden in tiny moments we're failing to appreciate. Maybe it's right there in the things we were already looking forward to, working towards and waiting for. We arrived. We just got used to being here.

This Isn't About Settling

None of this means you stop wanting things, making plans or getting excited about what comes next. I certainly don't.

But wanting what comes next doesn't require continually leaving what is happening now.

You can look forward to Saturday and still experience Wednesday. You can want the bigger house and still enjoy living in this one. You can work towards something exciting without treating everything before it as the bit you need to get through.

Because there will always be another thing to reach for. Another Monday. Another plan. Another deadline. Another idea. Another version of life that looks as though it might be easier, calmer, more exciting or more enjoyable than this one.

Which is precisely why it seems worth occasionally noticing where you've already arrived.

#Rebel Moment

The next time you reach something you've been waiting for, notice how quickly your mind tries to move the finish line. The end of the working day. Friday afternoon. Something you've finished. Somewhere you've been looking forward to going.

Before you ask yourself what's next, stay there for a moment. Look around.

Ahhhhh. I'm here.

This is the Friday you wanted to reach. This is the finished piece of work. This is the dinner you booked. This is the holiday you counted down to. This is the ordinary Wednesday inside a life you once imagined from somewhere else.

Then carry on. Make the next plan. Think about tomorrow. Get excited about whatever is coming.

Just remember to live here too.

Stay Blessed!

LoveLove

Nat x

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