Have you ever felt like you have an ordinary, boring life? In this age of Instagram and Facebook, we see our friends and acquaintances posting pictures and videos of their travels and other awesome things that are happening in their lives. All of this may sometimes make us feel that if we don’t have anything interesting to post, our lives are not as great. But what we miss when we have these thoughts is not the opportunity to travel or have and do awesome things. We miss out on the chance to look at our lives and see the great adventures that we have experienced, are experiencing, and will be experiencing, even in what seems to be mundane and trivial.
The Wonder and Joys of Childhood
When I look back at my childhood memories. I am amazed at how awesome my imagination was. I grew up not having a lot of toys because my family only had enough for the basic necessities. But I look back and I feel like I didn’t lack anything. I remember playing outside and imagining that I was a soldier and scraping my knees from crawling trying to dodge bullets. There was a time when I believed that I was a mermaid. My skin got burned from staying on the beach for long periods of time. I learned to cook rice from playing house – sneaking into our kitchen to get a fistful of grains and cooking them in a can – with real fire made from twigs. Then my father, who was a fireman, would lecture us about fire safety when we got caught. Those moments were priceless! I am grateful for them all – the mischief and the learning moments.
To love and be loved in return is an opportunity we can take as we live our life’s adventure.
Dating, Courtship & Marriage
Falling in love is a great adventure. People may or may not agree but love is a beautiful journey. My encounter with love started with the crushes that I had when I was a teenager. With the butterflies in my stomach, I learned that love is not always thrills and excitement. It can also involve heartaches and betrayals. I look back at the strange and funny feeling of liking someone. There were also moments when I needed to give way to other girls because we had the same crushes. When I remember those moments, I can’t help but laugh and also realize that some relationships are more important that other relationships. No wonder love is the most common story and song topic of all time. It takes us on a roller coaster ride. But for me, the greatest adventure was finding that one true love and choosing to stay together. I am now in an adventure that I consider the most important. My marriage has been nice, warm, scary, joyful, weird, lovely, and all the other emotions rolled into one. It is a great opportunity for me to be experiencing this type of adventure.
As we face the sunsets of our lives, let’s look back and find wonder and joy even in the simple things that happened to us.
The Journey Towards the Golden Years
I consider myself to be in the middle of my life. I have a goal age when I want to “retire” and I am about half of it right now. At this stage, I look forward to what the coming years have in store for me. Of course I feel the fear of the unknown, but also the excitement of someone who is trying to make a fallout shelter for the end of the world. Now, my adventure is preparing for the sunset of my life. There are still a lot of things to do and sometimes I get overwhelmed. But I have family and friends on this adventure with me. I feel passionately the need to fight for things that I know are important. Although I choose my battles wisely, I am very vocal about a few things that are precious to me. I fight for women and family, for truth, and for the environment. Part of my advocacy is wellness and good health. We have things we need to fight for in life and doing so is a great adventure in itself. I think aging is graceful if we are striving for something better.
As I look at life, we are all on a great adventure. It is sad that some people think their lives are less than those of others because nothing much is happening. There are a lot of things that are happening. We can make a lot of things happen. Our lives are not the same but life is a great adventure in itself. We fight villains and we stand with heroes everyday. As we journey home to our God, let us make every day count. May we leave a legacy of joy, learning, love and purpose as we live our own adventures.
