Time is rapidly fleeting. Are you making the most of it?

Recently, I was struck with this thought…”My life is happening so fast that I’m missing out on it.” Have you ever felt this way? Is your life packed full of activities and events and you’re simply trying to stay on top of everything? (Much less being able to actually enjoy it!) I certainly have. But my mission has been to change this.

Because I realize this moment is my life. Each seemingly mundane minute is the package my life’s wrapped in. I shouldn’t view my life in the future tense, but rather in the present. After all, I may never experience the future. But I have been given the blessing of now. This moment. And I’m loving it…as long as I’m choosing to embrace it.

So what keeps me from embracing and savoring the moments? Because, in reality, at times the word that best describes how I view my moments is “surviving” them. I find myself hanging on by a thread to the crazy rollercoaster of life. And rather than savoring, I find myself “inhaling”. But I don’t believe this is the kind of life God intends for any of us to live. At least not for a length of time.

God’s been working on me for awhile and I’ve made changes in my life, but I still want to grow in this area. I’d like to share four greatest hinderances I’ve experienced to embracing and savoring my ordinary moments.

1.) An idealistic mindset. You know, the mentality that “this” or “that” needs to be done before I can relax. The tendency to live for the future instead of enjoying today. An idealistic mindset focuses on what is less than ideal, rather than on what is good.

For example…I find it easier to do my blogging when I’m off by myself and uninterrupted. (There’s just something about a coffee shop, a creamy London Fog, and Lily’s chocolate to clear my thoughts!) Today, our plans changed, and instead of a coffee shop setting, I’m trying to hit the right key strokes as we’re bouncing down a bumpy road in a rather loud motorhome. My attempts at collecting my thoughts are disrupted by my husband’s phone conversations and the chatter of your four daughters. But… a little while ago, my little girl was snuggled up beside me as I was typing. And just now, another daughter came up, kissed my cheek and said, “I love you, Mom.” {Insert melted heart here!} I chose to embrace what I thought was less than ideal, and was able to see great blessing and beauty. Be aware that an idealistic mindset usually prevents joy in your journey.

2.) Comparing myself to others. Have you ever been contentedly enjoying the blessings God’s given to you, when suddenly it began to pale and vanish like a snowman on a sunny afternoon? (Now you’re left with only the red mittens!) Of course, this happened when you began comparing your “gift” with someone else’s. If you haven’t caught on to it yet, let me assure you that someone will always outdo you. There’s no sense in comparing yourself to others, and it steals your joy.

3.) Distractions. The phone calls. Text beeps. Email notifications. Doorbells. Latest tweet. Instagram notifications. The crazy-low sale of a favorite item you “need”. Expectations from a neighbor. The list is never ending…But these distractions can certainly prevent you from embracing the moments with those right around you. I’ve made a conscious choice of not having as broad of a focus, so I can more fully focus on the needs of my husband and daughters. It’s a constant battle for me to hear God’s heart in this area, since our ministry focus continues expanding.

4.) An ungrateful spirit. Life is filled with the day to day grime of frustrating challenges, unexpected twists and often unnoticed blessings. If you and I could simply remove our blinders of ungratefulness, we’d see immense beauty, innumerable gifts and experience immeasurable joy. And this is the very reason the enemy of our souls wants us to be ungrateful. To steal, kill and destroy.

My friend, our lives are simply made up of little moments. Brief periods of time that are here today, yet gone tomorrow. Before we know it, our children will be grown and out of our house. I don’t want to be too busy to enjoy the spark in my little girl’s eye, laugh at a joke (that may not be funny!), or savor the fleeting moments with my adult daughters. I want to live life slow enough to truly appreciate the beauty of fluffy white clouds nestled in a bed of blue. To live life simply so I don’t miss looking into the watery, lonely eyes of the elderly. Embracing our moments means noticing and appreciating the simplicity of life.

You and I only have this one chance at this gift of life. We can’t go back and undo what was done yesterday, but we have this moment. And we can take precautions to protect our moments. Some day, we’ll probably look back at this time as “the good ole days.” So why not embrace it now? It’s not too late! Because you’re living in the gift of this moment.

“Life is not measured by the number of breaths we take, but by the moments that take our breath away.”

~Cindy (For The Mullett Family)