What's Your Word?

I totally love reading stories with brilliant wisdom!  Stories like Eat Pray Love by Elizabeth Gilbert.  Stories like 20 Wishes by Debbie Macomber. Stories like We Bought A Zoo, and Second Hand Lions.  They are all really great stories within themselves, but they offer such a great sense of wisdom.

They are stories that I love to read, but I either have to stop and write thoughts and quotes down as I am reading, or I read once just for the love of the book, and then a second time to get the thoughts and ideas I want down on paper.  Is that crazy?  Maybe, but do I care if it is crazy?  Nope!  I love to read, and I love quotes.  I love inspiration, and I love others inspiration that feeds into my own!

For example in Eat Pray Love - well let's just say I totally loved the book.  I can picture myself being this person, if life had turned out differently for me!  I could totally do what she did!  I loved it.  I loved the concept of finding a word that represents who you are -

"Maybe you're a woman in search of her word" 

and I often think - maybe I am a woman in search of my own word.  It isn't what I do for a living, or what I think of myself, but who I am.  What represents me?  If I can find my own word, then will I find who I am?  Will I find me?  I think that as time moves and we grow with it, perhaps the word we use to describe ourselves may change, but there has got to be one word, that is me, regardless of how much time changes who we are.  My word?  I haven't figured that out yet, but I am working on it.

Another example in 20 Wishes by Debbie Macomber, is a book about figuring out what you want most in life and setting goals / wishes that they may come true.   A group of ladies meet, and agree each to set their own set of 20 wishes.  Through their own experiences they find out that wishes can really come true, and often it isn't in the way you would expect it.  It leaves you with the desire to set your own 20 wishes, and see what happens.  It's really about starting over again, and making life better.  I really enjoyed it, and ended with a renewed desire to be "that" person who started over and succeeded. One of Debbie's quotes I love the best is:

“Be an encourager. Scatter sunshine. Who knows whose life you might touch with something as simple as a kind word.”

We Bought A Zoo:  I never read the book, but I totally loved the movie!  One of my all time favorite quotes and philosophies of life has come from this - by Benjamin Mee -

“You know, sometimes all you need is twenty seconds of insane courage. Just literally twenty seconds of just embarrassing bravery. And I promise you, something great will come of it.” 

Isn't that just perfect!!!  I have used this many times in my life when I have felt unsure, or like something might not be worth it, and it has gotten me through!  I totally love it!  

In Letters to Juliet,  “Claire: Dear Claire, "What" and "If" are two words as non-threatening as words can be. But put them together side-by-side and they have the power to haunt you for the rest of your life: What if? What if? What if? I don't know how your story ended but if what you felt then was true love, then it's never too late. If it was true then, why wouldn't it be true now? You need only the courage to follow your heart. I don't know what a love like Juliet's feels like - love to leave loved ones for, love to cross oceans for but I'd like to believe if I ever were to feel it, that I will have the courage to seize it. And, Claire, if you didn't, I hope one day that you will. All my love, Juliet”
― Lise Friedman

Have you ever asked yourself "what if?"  Those two words can be the toughest two words a person can ever utter, but the most profound as well.  I loved this story and what it stands for.  Those of us in life who are wondering the "what if's".

And finally - in the movie Second Hand Lions - again I have never read a book, but have watched the show many, many times, and I love it.  When Uncle Hub is giving the talk about what every boy needs to know to be a man, he says - 

"Sometimes the things that may or may not be true are the things a man needs to believe in the most. That people are basically good; that honor, courage, and virtue mean everything; that power and money, money and power mean nothing; that good always triumphs over evil; and I want you to remember this, that love... true love never dies. You remember that, boy. You remember that. Doesn't matter if it's true or not. You see, a man should believe in those things, because those are the things worth believing in."

 I have said, and felt, on many occasions, that perhaps "so and so" needs to have this talk delivered to them.  Oh, how I love to find good messages in movies, books, and even songs.  There is just so much in life that is crap, we need to be able to see the good, pick it out from the piles of "stuff", and feed our souls happiness.  Wisdom can be found in goodness, and I love it!

On that note, there are stories within our own lives that contain brilliant wisdom as well.   Stories where we learn and grow.  Don't forget to write down the quotes and examples that contain brilliant wisdom from these stories, for they are ever as much a part of who we are, as the stories we read and learn from.  Stories from the lives of our loved ones, or stories from our daily experiences.  Quotes from our own lives can be just as memorable as a quote from a movie or a book.  Never overlook your life experiences and words as minimal for they are the most important ones YOU can learn from. 

Here is my question - What if, you wrote down your 20 wishes, and took that 20 seconds of insane courage, to find what you believe in, then moved forward 20 seconds at a time, would you be able to find your word, who you are, and what life means to you?  What if you did that?  What if something great came of it?  What if it gave you meaning in life? What if it shared a little bit of you, to create something better?  What if it found your true love?  What if it found YOU?  What if?

My Life Is Made Up Of Seconds

Writing Prompt - My life is made up of seconds - write for 20 minutes - Go.

It was interesting a couple of months back I had a birthday, that wasn't so interesting, but the phone call from my sister was interesting.  She told me that I had only 19 more years of 365 days to live until I reach 70 years old.  I had never really looked at life that way.  I always said life was zooming by way to fast, but to think of it that way kind of put a new twist on things.  I know lots of people who are 70 years old plus, and honestly I kept thinking that was a ways off yet for me, but looking over the grand scheme of things, it isn't so far.

Just how far is it?  Well let's figure it out.  I have 19 more years of 365 days which works out to 6935 days until I reach 70 years old.  Those 6935 days turn into 166440 hours until I am 70 years old.  Those hours turn into 9,986,400 minutes or 599,184,000 until I turn 70 years old.  Wow, when you break it down no wonder it goes by so fast.

Now I am not saying I am going to die when I turn 70 years old.  Quite the contrary, I hope I live to see 90 and beyond.  I am not afraid to die.  My beliefs have taught me that life on the other side will be pretty sweet, but while I still have 19 more years, 6935 days, 166,440 hours or 9,986,400 minutes or 599,184,000 seconds to go until I reach 70, then why not make every second count.

You see life is made up of seconds.  We each have 86400 seconds in each day.  That doesn't seem like very many, but that is what it is.  So what we each do with those 86,400 seconds in a day is what really matters.  We can choose to throw them away.  We can choose to work them to the bone.  We can choose to stare at a television or other kind of screen.  We can choose to make them productive, make each one count.  For in the grand scheme of things, 86,400 seconds in a day goes by way too quickly.

I don't want to waste any more of my seconds that make up my life.  I want to make them happy memories.  I want to make each day count.  I want to live some of my dreams in my next 599,184,000 seconds.  I want to spend them doing the things that I love to do.  I know I have to put a large portion of my seconds into work, so why not make work something I love to do as well.

No more time wasters for me.  You see I think television and video games are huge time wasters.  If I sit down and watch a tv program, I will always have a project in hand that I am working on.  I am just not that person who can sit still and do nothing.  That kills me.  I think I just need to shift my mind set to make sure that every second I live has a purpose or value to it.  That purpose might be as simple as playing with my grandchild, or going for a walk, or enjoy the sounds in my back yard, but whatever the purpose is, isn't as important as making sure each second has a purpose.

My life is made up of seconds, so is yours.  Let each second have a purpose, a value, a reason for using it, otherwise we are wasting seconds, and we don't have a lot of seconds to spare.  Think of it like a bank account.  We have $599,184,000 in our account.  What are you going to do with it?  Will you share it with those you love?  Will you waste it away foolishly, watching it dwindle in numbers until all of a sudden you realize you only have $86,400 left? You can't get it back when it is gone.  You can always make more money, but you can't get your seconds back.  I dare you to make a list of what you would do with the money, and make another list of what you will do with your seconds. 

Don't waste it.  Use your seconds wisely.  You only have 86,400 seconds a day.