“Paper chains…”

Shared by Breanne Smedley

I remember making those paper countdown chains as a kid.

Counting down the number of days left until summer break.
The number of days until Christmas.
Or, my birthday.

During those last weeks of school, I would get a spark of happiness as I (or one of my classmates) got to rip another colored piece of construction paper off the chain.

Signaling that we were getting that much closer to summer.

To no homework.
No more reading.
No more tests.
Freedom.

Now, as an adult, I feel like these paper chains are subconsciously still at work.

Countdown to the end of a four, six, or ten-week eating/exercising challenge.
Countdown to the next “stage” that our kids will get to.
Countdown to the next step in the career.
Countdown to retirement.

The idea that whatever counts in life will occur in the future.

That, at some point, the chain will come to an end and we have arrived.

Most of us know, this is a hoax.

At the end of six weeks of eating healthy and exercising, most people get right back to where they started (plus five pounds) within a couple of weeks.

The next “stage” in our kid's lives only brings different challenges than the last.

And waiting 65 years to finally experience the “best years” that are promised with retirement sounds like a waste of the years I have right now.

As Ralph Waldo Emerson said,

“We are always getting to live..

…but never living.”

I have realized that it never ends.

There will never be a point in my life where I get to a place where all my problems are solved.

Where I can just “relax.”

Not do anything. Coast.

My Lesser Self loves this image.

My Heroic Self knows that it’s an illusion.

That this journey of becoming my best self has no end.

So, instead of taking away a paper chain every day, trying to get to an illusion of a place where I’ve “made it.”

I like to think I’m adding everyday.

My habits, behaviors, and choices each a link that builds the long chain of my life.

A chain that never ends.

Because, I don’t want it to.

===

#MindfullyEvolving

Check out what we're up to now!