Just lately, in various settings, I hear the following mantra yelling into my ears:

Less thinking about it,
Less talking about it,
More doing it.

Because, the truth is, when it comes to what’s going to happen next:  I don’t really know anything.  None of us do.  We might think that we do, but we don’t.  Chinese whispers reverberate around us the whole time, and the truth gets distorted at every utterance of it to the point where… nobody really knows anything.  Even as soon as tomorrow, we may have an idea of what we’re going to be doing, but we don’t really know what it’s going to feel like – we don’t know if the traffic is going to delay us, who we might meet along the way, or what we’re going to see out of the window.

This is a life in which anything can happen at any time, so why do we only remember that sometimes?  Too often, it takes tragedy to remind us how life and the future are under no guarantee, and how lucky we are to be alive.  We hear of tragic stories on the news, or attend funerals, and vow to start making the most of every single second we have, but how many of us actually stick to this promise?  Such sentiment is too often short-lived – quickly forgotten once we realise that the trains are cancelled due to signalling problems, or that it’s raining outside…all minor inconveniences which become over-dramatised the second we forget how lucky we really are, just to be here breathing.

I used to be a ‘planner’, but time and time again I realised how it can be such a waste of time… blueprints which were so carefully arranged but ended up tossed in the bin with the objectives crossed out and amended as time went on and the conditioning factors gradually changed shape in the heat.  I still regard a bit of planning to be a necessity – a direction we need in order to keep ourselves looking forward – but when we put too much time and detail into those plans we are inadvertently setting rigid guidelines for ourselves and reducing the amount of space left for that factor of surprise to filter it’s way into.  It’s that factor of surprise which ultimately stops life from becoming a mere repetition of routine, day after day.

Essentially we only have one moment to ever do anything, and that is now.  If we really want something in life, we have to start working on it right now.  No more meticulous planning, just action.  We need to stop delaying our dreams until days which may never come, and start making the most of the present moment so that we can keep our lives full of surprise and retain the potential for new ideas to filtrate through.

I’ve come to the realisation that I’m never going to know whats going to happen to me next, and you know what? I’m not afraid of that anymore.  A good book is one to which you don’t know what the next page will bring.  Spontaneous is the key. I never thought I’d be the type to be able to plan and book a holiday just a few days before going, and I never thought I’d be so comfortable not knowing what I should do next in life but…

…I’m happy just to be here breathing, right now.  It’s time to really make the most of that, and squeeze as much juice out of each moments as possible.

Song of the Day:  Mexicolas – Take Off

“I know you’ve got a fear of heights, but everything will be alright”