Keep these things close to your heart
What are the important things you need to remember? (And by the way, I’m not talking about a grocery list or meeting someone for coffee).
I’m talking about ensuring that you don’t lose track of the meaningful moments in your life.
Recently, a group of women graciously invited me to join them as they work their way through Suleika Jaoud’s Book of Alchemy. One of the prompts was something like “Things I never want to forget”.
What a great topic! I filled more than a few pages with experiences that had left an indelible mark on me. And I could have written several more pages, because the more memories I wrote down, the more memories started crowding in.
Interestingly, the ones that came first weren’t about births, deaths, marriage or professional achievements. They were about the moments I was momentarily transfixed. Those moments where the Universe showered me with little reminders of the gift of being alive.
These moments weren’t asking me to figure anything out or make anything happen. But in those moments of awe, I was no longer caught up in my own thinking.
What I realized as I kept writing was that if I’m paying attention, these same types of moments continue to happen almost daily.
And this can be easy to overlook. Especially now, when so much of life feels uncertain or unsettled, and our attention is pulled towards what’s wrong, what needs fixing, or what might happen next.
While those concerns are, of course, important, they don't give us the inspiration to meet whatever comes our way.
Our hearts are "refueled" when we see the flash of blue from a bluebird’s wing. Or hear a child singing off key just for the joy of it. Even seeing something as mundane as a rainbow after a thunderstorm can stop us in our tracks.
The important thing about these moments is that they don’t “solve” anything. But they do something equally important: they give us a moment of freedom.
They pull us out of the constant stream of thought and put us back in contact with Life as it's unfolding right in front of us.
This, for me, is yet another example of creativity. Recently I suggested that creativity is not only a practice or a process but a response. And I’d like to add something else:
Our own personal creativity also involves noticing what’s right in front of us.
Perhaps this is what it means to keep something close to our hearts. To make space for the moments that light us up and give us reason to keep going. To respond to each moment with a deeper appreciation of what Life gives us without asking us for anything in return.
These kinds of moments have a profound effect on us when we make ourselves available to them. And rather than simply reacting or trying to manage what we’re faced with each day, we can instead draw from a deeper well of wisdom and kindness to wend our way through our lives.
I’m talking about ensuring that you don’t lose track of the meaningful moments in your life.
Recently, a group of women graciously invited me to join them as they work their way through Suleika Jaoud’s Book of Alchemy. One of the prompts was something like “Things I never want to forget”.
What a great topic! I filled more than a few pages with experiences that had left an indelible mark on me. And I could have written several more pages, because the more memories I wrote down, the more memories started crowding in.
Interestingly, the ones that came first weren’t about births, deaths, marriage or professional achievements. They were about the moments I was momentarily transfixed. Those moments where the Universe showered me with little reminders of the gift of being alive.
These moments weren’t asking me to figure anything out or make anything happen. But in those moments of awe, I was no longer caught up in my own thinking.
What I realized as I kept writing was that if I’m paying attention, these same types of moments continue to happen almost daily.
And this can be easy to overlook. Especially now, when so much of life feels uncertain or unsettled, and our attention is pulled towards what’s wrong, what needs fixing, or what might happen next.
While those concerns are, of course, important, they don't give us the inspiration to meet whatever comes our way.
Our hearts are "refueled" when we see the flash of blue from a bluebird’s wing. Or hear a child singing off key just for the joy of it. Even seeing something as mundane as a rainbow after a thunderstorm can stop us in our tracks.
The important thing about these moments is that they don’t “solve” anything. But they do something equally important: they give us a moment of freedom.
They pull us out of the constant stream of thought and put us back in contact with Life as it's unfolding right in front of us.
This, for me, is yet another example of creativity. Recently I suggested that creativity is not only a practice or a process but a response. And I’d like to add something else:
Our own personal creativity also involves noticing what’s right in front of us.
Perhaps this is what it means to keep something close to our hearts. To make space for the moments that light us up and give us reason to keep going. To respond to each moment with a deeper appreciation of what Life gives us without asking us for anything in return.
These kinds of moments have a profound effect on us when we make ourselves available to them. And rather than simply reacting or trying to manage what we’re faced with each day, we can instead draw from a deeper well of wisdom and kindness to wend our way through our lives.