Live Life

February 24, 2002

Live Life

I heard an advertisement on the radio for a web site. I thought they were saying www.livelife.com but they were actually saying “livelive.” Anyway, it got me thinking about what it really means to live life.

It seems that there are always opposing forces that are constantly working in our lives. For example there is order vs. chaos, joy vs. depression, and excitement vs. boredom. Living life seems to mean going through cycles of order and then chaos, joy and then depression, excitement and then boredom.  Life appears to resemble the stock market with its up and downs, the only constant being in its inconsistency. Yet in the end, even though there are daily losses and gains, progress is attained.

One of the biggest obstacles deterring us from becoming who we know we can be is inconsistency. For a few weeks or a month we can be consistent with our goals and desires, but then the cycle continues and we are brought back to our old ways or no ways, laziness. This then causes stress. We are not whom we want to be, we are not doing what we want or need to be doing. We were succeeding just last week or even yesterday but today there is no energy left to keep fighting, no desire left to be the person we envision or maybe the vision all together is gone. So the life cycles continue; excitement leads to boredom, order to chaos, and joy to depression.

The secret to living a happy life is in being consistent.  Of course there will be ups and downs but the goal is to keep the downs to a minimum and the ups higher. When we retire we want our overall stock market experience to be made mostly of gains. The losses are going to be there, but their effect at the end is minimal. If anything the losses have taught us to be resilient, to stick with it even through the hard times, and to not quit.  We continue moving forward and upward, adding the good and deleting the bad.

Deleting the bad is a survival technique. We forget the bad experiences, the traumatic times, or at least their impact is lessened over time, and we remember more clearly the good times. For example, why do women have more than one child? Pregnancy and childbirth are definitely not pain free. Both are difficult and trying not only physically but also emotionally.  So why after experiencing all of the pain and the bad do woman do it all over again and sometimes again and again. The answer is because a mother literally forgets. The joy and excitement of holding your baby and watching him or her grow and learn washes the pain away. She wants another child to nurture and care for no matter the costs. It is a survival technique.

Yet, we don’t want to totally forget all the bad that has ever happened. Learning from the past and from good and bad experiences help us live life. The cycles of life need to be and must be recorded, not only for our personal benefit but also for the benefit of our our predecessors.  Recording experiences is the only sure way to remember them. Journals, pictures, letters, scrapbooks, blogs and other methods help us record the cycles of life whether they are the losses or the gains.

So get out there and live life! Be as consistent on a constant basis as possible. Throw out the chaos with order, overcome depression with joy, and lose boredom to excitement. Living a happy life means winning over the long haul and not necessarily each day.  Being as consistent as possible is the key. Growing and improving on our daily investments is the goal so that over time we are better than what we started out to be.

Baby Love

January 24, 2002

Baby Love

I read an article out of a magazine entitled “Baby Love” about a three months after Ellie, my first child, was born. This was an article that stirred my emotions, kindled a flame in my soul, brought tears to my eyes, and all the other frequently used cliches that do little to truly explain our inner most feelings.

I hadn’t realized that I was “baby hungry” until I had given birth to Ellie and read that article. It expressed so clearly what I was feeling. My husband and I had decided to try and conceive because frankly I was getting old. I had no “burning desire” to have a child, even though I wanted children and knew that I would have several.

My main reason for getting pregnant was because of my age: 24 years old! I know that isn’t old but by my age my mother had given birth to three children and a fourth was soon to be on the way. We wanted several kids and also a good, early retirement; we needed to get busy.

To have a baby is an amazing feeling. It is one of accomplishment, shock and disbelief. Men should really be given the chance to experience this miracle first hand someday. The actual feeling of having a baby whoosh out of you with the warmth of the liquid is something difficult to explain. To see that your baby is healthy and whole and to hear her first cry and to feel her sucks at your breast completes the miracle of the actual birthing experience.

Getting to know each other is the truly difficult part. Making the adjustment is strange. Even though this child has been growing inside of you over the last 40 weeks and you’ve felt her kicks and movements and heard her heart beat, you are still strangers. You are both new at this. What do her cries mean? How do I feed her? Why won’t she go to sleep! But soon it all seems natural—it is natural. It is as if you were never apart.

You were together once as dear friends in the heavens. You are each a daughter of God and beloved of Him. You were a spiritual family, now an earthly family and soon will be an eternal family.

Such trust and love come from her eyes. Will I keep the promises I made before we both embarked on this journey here on earth? Will I teach her of Jesus, his teachings and resurrection, and of love and life eternal?

I cried when I could not feed my baby milk from my breasts. “All I want is to feed my baby!” I cried out in anger at God. But softly came the reply, “Be at peace, my daughter. More important than your milk is your love. Teach her to feast on the words of Christ for then she will never hunger nor thirst.” 

Baby love and baby hungry have taken on new meanings for me now: “Teach me to walk in the light of his love.”