Counting Down To Death?

by Ashley Elizabeth Petryshyn

I am a girl that gets excited about things easily. I try to make little parts of my day things to look forward to, and I usually have a countdown going on to count down the days to things I'm really excited about. This is especially true seeing as how in July I booked a vacation with my best friend for...OCTOBER. I haven't been so excited to do something in such a long time. About to weeks ago I was looking through the App store and was intrigued by one about countdowns. It was free, so I downloaded without much thought. I quickly loaded in the date of my vacation and much to my dismay, the app told me it would be 84 days until my vacation. I even posted on social media about it. I said “84 days isn't too early to count down a vacation right guys?!?” To my surprise, I had friends say they have started count downs with more than 100 days to go to an event!

So, of course, this go me thinking. As kids we are taught to count down to things like Christmas and Easter, to look forward to the weekend during the school week and to count away the days that bring summer vacation. I remember being in grade 1 and being told to bring '100 somethings' to school. We all sat in our desks and counted to 100 to celebrate making it to the hundredth day of class. Another good example would be my summers away at bases across Alberta for the Cadet program, you would be counting down the days until your contract started and you could see your friends every day of the summer, and then as soon as some people go there, the count down to go home would start. I even once upon a time was engaged and we had started the count down from a year from the date of the wedding. That isn't crazy right? So this is a learned behaviour brought on by a culture of excitement. To be excited for the weekend, vacation or Christmas. 

Do not boast about tomorrow, for you do not know what a day may bring.  // Proverbs 27:1

Do you have a Facebook or Pinterest account? You probably have at least one form of social media you plug into. I am asking this because I bet that you are the same as me and at times your pages can become overwhelmed with “live each day to the fullest!” or “ you can dream it you can do it!” pictures. Are our countdowns to things in life counter productive to living each day as the best we could? I feel like I am sometimes guilty of this. It will be a Wednesday and I'll leave work feeling like I didn't have the best day and then I will head home and not want to do chores and then I write the day off. Simple as that! If Wednesday wasn't good, I mentally tell myself that its okay because at least the weekend is close. REALLY ASHLEY? The weekend is still two whole entire complete days away! What am I gaining by justifying to myself that its okay to not do anything today, because Saturday is coming? The answer I have learned is... absolutely nothing!

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Still be excited and count down the days to events that make you happy, but try not to write off the days in between! You never know what kind of magic could happen on a random Tuesday if you are constantly counting down to your Saturday!

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Now I still have the app on my phone, counting down my days but I have changed my mindset about it. Instead of telling myself it is okay to have bad days because I am going on vacation soon, ( I know it isn't very soon) I try my best to live each of my days to the very best. Now, forgive the cliche you are about to read from me, but how do you know today that you are going to get a tomorrow? Let me tell you, you don't know. So if you have no idea when you wake up in the morning if it is going to be your last day or not, why wouldn't you try to live it to the best of your ability? What if you wake up at 70 years old and realize that your whole life you have been counting down to a few events that make you happy, when in reality there is a huge majority of your life left un-lived! We don't need to be counting down our days, we need to be grateful and living for all of them!

 So my challenge to you readers of mine is this: Still be excited and count down the days to events that make you happy, but try not to write off the days in between! You never know what kind of magic could happen on a random Tuesday if you are constantly counting down to your Saturday! I am totally a part of this challenge as well because as I sit here and write this, there are 62 days between me and a jet plane! 

Lets go live ALL our days!