Among the Flowers

Do you ever catch yourself talking about all the things you’ve been “meaning to do?” Thing you’ve tucked away in the back of you mind for years and years… and yet somehow you never seem to get around to actually doing?

I spent most of my life been famous for this – famous for constantly saying things like “oh I have been dying to travel there” or “I have always wanted to try that restaurant” or “I have been meaning to do that” or “I just haven’t found the time”

But this past year I have been really making an effort to stop saying things like “I haven’t found the time”, and instead just changing my mind set to making the time for all these things I keep saying “I have been meaning to do.”

Making the time…

I know it sounds simple… but when you actually put it into practice in your life when you’ve been living the complete opposite way – it is truly a revelation.

I mean come on, “making the time”… it sounds so simple right? So incredibly obvious – and that’s because it is! It has completely changed my point of view in that I truly believe now that if you want something in your life… then you can always make the time for it.

It might mean adapting your schedule; making yourself a calendar and really budgeting your time; Or it might mean waking up an hour earlier or spending less time watching Netflix or on social media… but we all have the power to make the time for what we want in our lives.

And tied together with this I have been slowly trying to teach myself that a little spontaneity never hurt anybody…

All of my life – until recently – I have been a planner. The kind of person who had an entire timeline for my life planned out – life moments that I foolishly thought that I somehow had control over – like if I did enough calculating, I could somehow predict the future.

If you asked my friends and family to describe me a few years ago, they would probably describe me as “over calculated” and nobody would have ever even thought to use the word “spontaneous” to describe me…

Once I hit university, I was basically scheduling my life down to the hour in in an effort to control everything that was happening around me. I made no time for fun, frivolous activities because I thought in order to have the life I thought I wanted, that meant working 24/7; I thought it meant going to school, getting a degree, finding a “good” job and making good, steady money.

It got to the point where the idea of a spontaneous activity used to give me anxiety because it meant I would no longer have the time to do the things I thought “I had to do.”

I used to chalk all this behaviour up to me just “being me.” I had all these definitions of myself like oh “I’m just a type A personality” or “I’m introverted” , “I’m shy”, I’m socially awkward”, “I’m boring”…

Definitions of myself that people had labelled me with over the years, and I had come to accept as being true. I let these things define me; I let them control me and lull me into a false ideology that I couldn’t change them – that because I had always been that way, I couldn’t evolve and become a better version of myself…

But these labels are not all that we are – and we can change if we want to… Again, such an obvious concept – but this was a revelation for me this year.

This year I made it something of a mission to push myself out of my comfort zone; to stop planning every single detail; to try new things; to meet new people; to be spontaneous…

All of a sudden I was breaking the barriers of these labels that had once defined me, and proving that there was more to me than them… that I am complex and unique and yes I am who I am, but I can grow…

In the past if someone invited me to something super last minute – my programmed response was simply “oh I can’t I have other plans” even if I didn’t, because I just couldn’t handle the “unplanned” activity. Too many opportunities for disaster… (at least that’s what I made myself believe.)

And if someone invited me to an event a week in advance – even if I knew deep down that I would have a good time once I got there – I could (and would) overthink to death. So 99% of the time I would talk myself out of social situations; I could psych myself out of anything. Even a coffee date with my best friend – I would worry about how awkward I am – my mind racing through all these worst case scenarios of why I definitely shouldn’t go…

Spontaneity has become my secret weapon against anxiety and overthinking – things that used to paralyze me. This year I have been developing a new habit of leaping before I look, because I realized that when I do that, I’m not allowing myself the time to form the doubt; to psych myself out… and I found that 90% of the time everything worked out wonderfully, and the other 10% of the time, I still came out alive, and with new life lessons learned… So basically it’s been a win win.

A friend of mine, Rosemary, has been a huge support in helping me break these barriers. So whenever she invites me out on a last minute excursion, I don’t overthink – I just say yes.

Such was the case last night when she invited me out for a spur on the moment trip to a local Tulip Festival. In the past, I know I would have said no to this. I would have either made the excuse that because it was so last minute “I didn’t have time” or let thoughts of possible crowds, or finding parking or getting there and having it not be as beautiful as we had imagined be enough reason for me to just say no… and then the next day I would have kicked myself for not going.

So this time when she asked, I shut my mind off, we went, and it could not have been a more wonderful evening. An evening filled with the kind of moments that I know I will look back on fondly when I’m old. Simple moments like running through tulip fields, watching people enjoy the scenery, swinging on wooden swings, and cruising in a car on the open road with nothing but good music, and the sun setting in front of us…

These are the spontaneous, unplanned moments that I have come to cherish so much…