I sat across from my brother on the Monday of the last week of December. He furiously answered emails, jotted to-do lists and ambitiously attempted to answer emails before the year came to a close. I stared at him in awe. Remembering a time when I was that eager to work, eager to put in more hours to show my commitment, eager to produce, eager to prove and eager to perform.
He looked up at me, and asked, “T, what are your goals for next year.” I simply replied, “I have none.” He responded, “Wow, T, this is the first time I think that I’ve ever heard you say that. You’ve always had goals. You’ve always had a plan.”
I’ve always had a plan.
As soon as you enter my front door, there sits my Aunt Latrice’s green wicker trunk filled with my high school memorabilia and every single planner I’ve owned since fourth grade. I’ve been religiously and meticulously planning my life since I was 10 years old. For twenty-five years, I’ve always had a plan. In December, something was calling me to relinquish my natural inclination to live by a planner and instead challenge myself to live for the day. So instead of planning my weeks, I wake up with a sheet of paper and ask myself what I want to do with my time. How do I want to spend my day?
Doing this practice for the first twenty five days of this new year, I’ve realized that in the past I was always living for the future and never living for the present moment. Because I was always chasing the future, I was constantly looking down, immersed in the work instead of embracing opportunities right in front of me.
Instead of chasing checklists, I am chasing the present moment feverishly. Instead of looking down, I am looking up and facing what’s right in front of me.
I am looking up and facing what’s right in front of me.
I am embracing and welcoming long conversations with people in quaint coffee shops. I am no longer asking people to postpone meetings when they can actually happen right now. I am welcoming new ideas, new partnerships even when there is no agenda or no direct asks. I am welcoming healthy detours that can lead me to unknown paths. I am inviting curiosity back into my life. I am basking in dreaming sessions that may result in nothing but laughter and uncanny hope. I am seeing everything for what it is and not what it’s supposed to be or could be. I am understanding that life shouldn’t be lived rigidly and instead I am bending life’s edges.
I am also spending the year looking around.
The city has changed and I haven’t changed with it. I have become conditioned to my five mile radius existence of only frequenting the same three places every day, walking the same paths in the forests, buying the same groceries, doing the same workout at the Ymca. I’ve limited myself and my experiences and therefore have been left uninspired and frankly unmotivated and probably a little too comfortable. I am looking around and moving more intentionally. Removing “work from home” from my lexicon and instead plotting places to visit around the city. Challenging myself to move. Leaving my house behind and it’s creaky wooden floors, neighbors who’ve come and gone, and replacing it with city pavement, bustling streets, crowded studios and galleries. I am looking around for myself and hope to find it in the slithers of light dancing in an artist's studio I happen to stumble upon. I am looking around for restoration, for the unfamiliar and possibly the unknown.
I am also looking beside.
I am looking beside me and activating my village. I tend to call on my village when I am in dire need of support whether professionally or personally. I am looking beside me to develop my relationships with my friends on a more intimate level, welcoming silly day time dates, late night face-times, morning walks, and movie dates. I want to fall in love with my community more. I want to pour into my people in a way that asks for nothing in return but a simple smile and a hug that says see you next week. I want to be a cheerleader on the weekends for races, show up for birthday parties and experiences.
After I’ve looked up, around and beside me. I hope I come closer to the work of my heart. I hope I find what makes my soul stir again. I hope that I discover what lights me up. I hope to spend more time talking to God than scheduling meetings on my google calendar. I hope I find that my life’s purpose is known as that girl who found a way to appreciate the present moment instead of always looking down wondering why the sun didn’t shine today.
thank you for the fresh air 💛