“If you take care of the moments, the years will take care of themselves.”

Summer around here is always a little strange. We have no routine. And I know the point of summer is to have no routine, but I’m not necessarily talking about the “school routine”. I’m meaning the “not sure who is sleeping at our house tonight” routine. Because of summer scheduling and vacations, all our usual “who’s at Mom’s house, who’s at Dad’s house” routine is totally off, and it is not a great feeling.

We miss the gang. Rarely are we all together right now.

And that sucks, because we miss out on so many moments. Yes, we get “our vacation” time with them (mainly in August this year – and it is always amazing), but it’s the every day moments that I miss.

Because those every day moments are what creates life.

This little saying from Tibet really resonated for me as having teenagers in the house… well… they don’t always get that the minutes turn into years and impact your years. And as you get older, you wish that you had taken care of some different moments… How I wish I can impart on them that a few minutes of studying now and every day after, will make that test much easier next week. That the dollar saved now and every day after will give you a nice nest egg in later years. That putting those socks in the laundry basket now, will make cleaning your room easier later:)

Rob had his yearly check up with his cardiologist yesterday. He has been doing great, and is such an awesome example to us all (well, to me…the kids are at the age that they don’t really understand what an awesome example he is…. are your sensing that I am feeling a little worn by the teens in our house??)

Despite doing great,  he was super nervous about his appointment. This was one that he knew they were going to let him know if he could discontinue a medication that initially was a lifesaving – can’t miss a dose – kind of med. And, of course, the doc told him he can stop it. Cold turkey (which that in itself makes him nervous so he is heading to the pharmacist today to “double check”). He is doing so amazing, that the intern can not tell by his ECG that he had ever had a heart attack. He is in great shape. Doing well. But the doctor warned him to not stop doing what he was doing.

Why is he doing so well? Because he takes care of the minutes. He eats well. He sleeps. He runs. He talks about his stress. He lifts weights. He wants to buy a new car. (Wait? How is that related? I’m not sure. But I’m pretty sure he thinks it is:))

Not  every minute is perfect. Thank goodness. Initially it was hard as he was being vigilant every moment. Happy to say that there is some balance, but the rule is there, and the exception is not overused. Which is key, I think. When the exception becomes the rule, then everything changes.

The minutes may seem so small, but they create your whole future. You don’t have to use every minute wisely (and of course, we all can define what we consider to be a wise use of time), but we all need to realize that our minutes ARE our life. If we postpone things that we will do “in a few years” we may come to find that it would have been much easier had we just taken on a few minutes at a time now….