Wake Up and Come Alive Again

Life is not lost by dying

Life is lost minute by minute

Day by dragging day

In all the small and uncaring ways       

Stephen Vincent Benet​

And so I noticed…

A friend sitting next to me. The crinkles around my husband’s grey-blue eyes. My son’s screechy, playful singing along to a silly song on the radio. My sister’s beautiful, handmade quilt. A fresh-roasted cup of coffee. A cold winter day. A warm cheese enchilada. My dear Egyptian friend showering me with encouragement. My daughter burying her head onto my shoulder as she cries. A fried chicken, finger-lickin’ lunch split with a friend. My grandfather’s gregarious, contagious laughter. My breath.

I noticed… and slowly, life began to seep back into the extremities… auto-pilot began to dissipate…

I listened to an inspiring interview recently with Ellen Langer who studies mindlessness at Harvard University where she talked about how the act of noticing brings zest back into our work life, marriage, parenting:

And so, mindfulness, for me, is the very simple process of actively noticing new things. When you actively notice new things that puts you in the present, makes you sensitive to context. As you’re noticing new things, it’s engaging. And it turns out, after a lot of research, that we find that it’s literally, not just figuratively, enlivening. Ellen Langer, On Being

Today I am grateful to be alive.

Wake Up

Do you have a body? Don’t sit on the porch!
Go out and walk in the rain!
If you are in love,
then why are you asleep?
Wake up, wake up!
You have slept millions and millions of years.
Why not wake up this morning?

Kabir