We salute the passing year, some with a sigh, some with a warm heart, some running so fast they barely noticed, some crawling to the end unsure if they even survived and some still trying to catch their breath and understand what transpired and what it all means.
As we look forward, we count the days, the minutes and seconds. We pile our expectations and hope on the New Year to come. We wait for it to drop like an unknown storm; the unwritten has always carried some kind of romanticized mystique. History may contain the lessons but the future has always held the hope and provided the freedom, the air, the wandering winds necessary for our dreams to take flight.
But are we simply setting ourselves up for failure? Are we forgetting the most powerful of times? Sure, we all know what is said about people who forget the past and of all the people I know, I chase the hope and dreams of the future with the persistence of a seasoned addict. But we can't forget the present.
The present. Isn't it just the culmination of the past staring squarely in the face of the expectation, promise and demands of the future? Could it be more?
Sometimes we have a moment so important our minds simply want a pass. It's just too much to process the emotion, the magnitude of what this moment could mean. It's a moment that makes us rethink our conclusions and beliefs which immediately pulls the rug out from under the foundation of our future. These are pretty much foundation wrecking experiences and I think anybody that wants to have an ounce of depth will find them unavoidable. These moments, they always happen in the present. Things like joy only happen in the moment. Sure, maybe you can have a joyful memory but isn't that just a pale copy?
The present, the now, this moment is powerful and so are we. In this moment we are kings and queens. We have the power to change a life, to change our own. We have the power to reflect on the past or dream about the future. But we also have the power to simply live.
The New Year is an institution, but the present is so much more -- it's a gift, it's within reach, it's a stray dog following us around till the day we die hoping only to be embraced. It's life and death and adventure and horror but more than anything it is simply what we make of it and it's importance should never be forgotten.
On that note I say Happy Now. Put your phone down, kiss somebody you love and don't even take a picture. Do something crazy. Be happy, be whole if you can for even just a moment... find some joy and then find some more.
Follow Nathaniel Mueller on Twitter @natejmueller
Originally Published under the title "Happy Now" on Medium
Photo Credit: Trea McNeely