Living a Slow Life

On occasion, I consider where I'm "at" in life. I think about what I've accomplished and what I wish I had already completed at this point. When I get really negative about stuff my brain tries to say that my life is "bad" but I logically know that's incorrect. The more I've been pondering this idea of what a "bad" life is the more I understand that my life isn't "bad" (for a multitude of reasons) but it feels bad sometimes because frankly, it's slow.

I haven't achieved nearly any of the things I thought I would by this point. As a kid I thought by now I'd be married, I'd own my own home, I'd have a profitable career as a writer, and I'd have multiple books published. I seriously thought those things would be easy and doable by 30.

Clearly, I didn't have the life experience, nor did I know myself well enough to understand my own limitations to ultimately make a better prediction of when and how my life goals would be reached. Also, those goals have shifted a bit over the years from the ones I had as a child which clearly child me could not have accounted for.

Adult me should be disappointed that child me wasn't the greatest predictor of adult me's successes and failures. 

But some days I really am disappointed. So I try to remind myself that being behind on some sort of life plan doesn't make my life "bad," waiting a few more years to achieve goals doesn't make my life "bad," being a different person than who I expected to be still doesn't make my life "bad."

My path is a slow path, I live a slow life. I will eventually get the things I'm aiming for but it will be a lot slower than I expected and I have to accept that or go crazy trying.

It's The Little Things

Sometimes we get so caught up in what we don't have, what we have yet to achieve, what big goals are still waiting for us in the distance... Many spiritual beliefs tell us to be in the moment, to live day to day, to not worry of the future or regret the past but it's hard to look at the little things. We think happiness arrives in the form of a romantic relationship, a career achieved, loads of money, etc. But every small smile, every short second of kindness, every quick laugh, those things compile into a lifetime of happiness - we just have to be looking for them.

A few years ago I got a small beanie baby unicorn from a store called Five Below. I got the unicorn because it's cute and I love unicorns. Recently, I found out that a certain fast food chain was carrying several tiny beanie babies, one of which was a pink unicorn. I went to one and they did not have it and I promptly forgot about it. Last night though, while in the drive-thru of this fast food chain I remembered and my sister asked the woman working the speaker system if they had the unicorns in stock. She assured us that they did and so we asked for one. When we received our food we found that instead of a unicorn there was a dumb video game toy in our bag.

As much as I love unicorns I really don't like confrontations so I was willing to resign myself to going home without a new unicorn (because really who needs more crap anyways?) but my sister decided she would march into the restaurant and tell them that "her daughter (yes she told them daughter because we were asking for a kid's toy) loves unicorns and she specifically requested the unicorn" to which the counter person responded that they did not have any unicorns but she was free to look through what they did have. Upon a quick glance of the beanies that were there, she easily spotted the pink unicorn (which looks a bit more like a horse but whatever).

So in the end I got my unicorn and it's little things like that which really make a person happy in life. Yes, it's awesome to make lots of money and to achieve your career dreams, and to have kids, and a marriage, and a beautiful home and all the other things people dream about, but it's the little things that sustain you when those bigger things are far off, or didn't work out as you planned. Little things like a tiny unicorn buddy for your already tiny unicorn, and a sister going out of her way to make sure that your unicorn has a new friend. :)

Tiny Unicorn.

Tiny Unicorn and Big Sister Unicorn.