Day 30, Slow Down and Experience It

Vacations in the past could be very difficult for me. Let me be honest, the travel and bustle combined with trying to care for the girls in a new location can have me roaming for the treats and chips for something to take the edge off and give me that feeling of vacation fun that everyone else is talking about. 

As I’m writing this, we are actually on vacation. My sweet aunt lent us our cabin up in northern Arizona for the week. Part of my personal spiritual growth these days has been centered around slowing down and becoming aware of what is going on in the here and now. It was so strange, because I expected vacation to come with the stress I expect, and honestly, the first day was full of many challenges. However, on that second day, I really settled into our time together as a family. We went to the lake and fished, lounged at the cabin, played games, and watched movies. Even with the well-stocked cabin, I was surprised not to be anxiously walking around looking for a treat to make vacation feel like a vacation.  SEE INSTAGRAM LINK

In order for you to experience this liberation from needing something extra at the end of the day to feel like it was a truly  good day, you can break this down into two steps. 

1. Be fully present to what is happening around you. When you do this, you richly experience what is happening around you. Tune into your five senses. Think about what you can see, taste, hear, feel, and smell. Think “mono-task”. Make your one task to truly be in the moment and squeeze every possible drop of experience from it. 
2. Commemorate it in someway. Perhaps you can take a moment to write about it in your journal. Or, and my daughter loves this one, re-live it with your family later at the dinner table. This seals the experience into your long-term memory and gives your life a richness that cannot be mimicked by food or alcohol. I did this on our vacation. I wrote about it and we talked about it again at the dinner table. 

I truly believe this is how we are meant to live. Jesus said in John 10:10, NLT, “The thief’s purpose is to steal and kill and destroy. My purpose is to give them a rich and satisfying life.” Amen to that. God is asking us to trust Him and enjoy the life we have and the people in it.

Journal Prompt: Pick a moment today that you would like to experience fully. Now, after you have lived it, staying in the present and paying attention to each sense, did you take the time to write about it in your journal or re-live it with a friend or loved one? What is your level of satisfaction at the end of the day? 

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