Carpe Diem! Seize The Day While You Can!

Conversations with my doctor would be a great sub title for this post!

I shared here years ago about a conversation that we’d had when I had reached a cross road in life.

Well, we had another one of those conversations today, years on, and it went along in a similar vein. I have more choices to make!

I said to him, “well I guess as one door closes in our lives, another opens”. His reply was direct, and to the point: “How long have we known each other? Haven’t they always opened?”

Now I don’t want to sound like some boring, lonely old sod who has no one to talk to but his doctor.

It’s just that I have lived here so long that I know almost everyone in town.

And they know me as well, so when I got to talking about stress to the doctor, he knew which areas to prod, and to suggest change in.

Anyway, change and grow I must.

The last thing that I want to do is stagnate and rust away, and keeping an active mind and healthy body are part of my plan to avoid that.

I’ve been getting more involved in photography lately, and have stepped up to the mark and invested in a new DJI Inspire drone, as well as a new camera.

While I am not an expert by any means, I am starting to get offers of work (I’m licensed to fly a UAV commercially).

This all sounds very exciting, but it means kicking out the support of another part time job that has funded a lot of my adventures up to this point.

And that’s how I came to be chatting to the doctor.

Between working the business, working in a part time job, and family stuff I’d begun to get a bit stressed out, though I hadn’t realized it.

The part time job represents security. It’s probably a link to my blue collar upbringing, and the need for security.

Having said that, I realize that the security that we all crave for is a myth.

Depending on an employer or government for that security is the worst way to try and get it!

Michael Hyatt talks a lot about drifting in his book “Living Forward”

Having a life plan and knowing where you want to end up are part of the theme of the book, as is the need to stop drifting.

I wish that I had read the book years ago, but it’s not too late, I can still change.

My friend Errol is over 65 and he’s got a real buzz from the book.

He’s leaving for a trip to the Simpson desert in a week or two, and when they return, he and his wife are flying out to London.

He figures that he still has a lot of living to do, and who am I to argue.

Abraham Lincoln said “…in the end it is not the years in your life that count, it’s the life in your years.”

How about you? Are you drifting?

I’ve found lately that it has been very easy to relax and coast, living day to day.

When you have a regular income flowing in with not too much effort, it takes away that hunger to grow.

And that can be dangerous as you grow older.

Now is the time to be storing and growing for my years when I don’t want to, or can’t work.

And while that’s possible, you need to grow to be able to do it without living like a pauper.

What do you think? Why do you need to stop drifting?

Below: “Seize The Day” by Carolyn Arends.