Saturday January 9, 2009

A Joyful Morning To You All,

As I woke up this morning, I repeated my gratitude chant, which is very simply my choice for the day. " I choose joy or sorrow, I choose happiness over sadness and I choose Life! I do this to conscientiously remind myself that today is a gift, the present I receive every day as it were. Today is promised to no one. So I had better earn my stripes today and ensure a possible tomorrow. So even though I live in the present, I am cognizant of of the needs of my future and in so doing lay the groundwork for a possible and better tomorrow. I do not take the future for grant it, rather I accept the possibility of its existence even within the realm of my limited senses. What I mean in order to live as spiritually as I can, I acknowledge my limited abilities on this front.

In the movie "City Slickers", Daniel Stern's character is having a crisis in his life. Nothing has turned out quite as he has imagined,(sound familiar), and he is about to give up all hope of ever living any semblance of a "great" life. However, his friends have another plan for him, they remind him that as children when they would play there games and it did not turn out as planned, they would shout, "Do over", and they would start the game over. Well life is not so , simple, but the idea is still the same. Every December 31st, we resolve in some manner to make amends for the past year shortcomings, we acknowledge our failings and promise ourselves, we resolve to do better in the coming year, a do over. But we don't have to wait til New Years Eve to make promises we fail to keep, we don't have to wait twelve months to try to right the wrongs we have committed or endeavors we have tired and come up short.

We go to bed every night and for most of us, we wake up the next morning. We repeat this ritual every night of our life. So is this not the same thing we do once a year. What I am saying is we get another chance 365 days a year to make our lives better. We get a chance to resolve the conflicts and opportunities presented to us daily. I suppose if we thought of everyday and every evening as another chance at life, if we held sacred this nightly ritual, we would do more to correct, our behaviors and take advantage of the opportunities we are given (some of you may think of these challenges as problems or issues, but they are opportunities none the less).

So every night we give up the ghost so to speak and every morning we are reborn. In many cultures and religions this single idea is the main tenant of their Article of Faith. So imagine if you will that you have the power, the ability to to exact one more promise from the Universe, to make your plea in the sacred, spiritual court of the Creator, (an interesting thought).The slate wiped clean and ready for you to write a new chapter in your life. Now keep in mind that the Universe may be infinite in the number of "do overs" you may get, you on the other hand have a finite number of days, years and months, so it is up to you not waste a moment, second or hour of your life. Start today, right now to set your life in order, because in reality, we don't know our expiration date, so we may live in the moment, we must still make plans for our future, a kind of moment to moment plan layed side by side with our future hopes and dreams. Because it is our hopes that give us today, it is our dreams that give us tomorrow!

With much joy,
Robb