Ordinary Things…
Greeting dear friends & fellow navigators, & welcome to my world this week. Sometimes I think we spend so much of our lives searching for the one thing to change everything, only to realize life has quietly been shaped by the things we keep returning to all along.
For a long time, I believed there would be a moment when life would finally begin. A day when everything would make sense, when I would feel ready, certain, & complete. I thought meaning would arrive in something extraordinary.
But now I realize & I wonder if I was looking in the wrong place. Perhaps there was never a secret waiting to be found. Life has always been growing in the ordinary things we almost forget to notice.
A page written before breakfast. A walk without checking the time. Watching the sunset even when you have seen hundreds before. Calling someone you love just to hear their voice. Watering a plant. Reading a few pages of a book. Smiling at a stranger. Beginning again after an ordinary disappointment.
None of these moments seem remarkable on their own. Yet somehow, they become a life. I think we often underestimate ordinary things because they do not ask for applause. They do not arrive with fireworks or announce they are changing us.
Sometimes when I think about writing. There are days when the words come easily, & there are days when they do not come at all. Still, I return to the page. Not because I know where it will lead, but because writing reminds me, I am paying attention to my own life. In the same way, I watch sunsets not because each one is different, but because each one gently reminds me to slow down.
I do not think life is asking us to become extraordinary. I think it is asking us to be present enough to notice the ordinary moments are already shaping us into the people we are becoming. And this is more than enough.
This is why the most beautiful lives are rarely built in dramatic moments. They are built in the ordinary ones we choose again & again.
Looking back, I do not remember every busy day. I remember conversations lasting longer than expected. I remember evenings beneath an open sky. I remember laughter making time disappear. I remember the quiet moments when I felt completely present. Those were never small moments after all.
Perhaps there was never a secret ingredient. It has always been the small things we underestimate, showing up, trusting our instincts, remaining kind, beginning again, & believing the slowest days are carrying us somewhere.
Because we think success is measured by how much we have, but sometimes it is simply about how well we make it through. Everyone has their own idea of success. But whatever success means to us, it cannot stay if there is not a quiet determination to keep showing up for what truly matters. Reaching somewhere is one thing, remaining there asks us to keep becoming the kind of person who returns to
the things having brought us there in the first place.
In the end, a beautiful life is nothing more than an ordinary one, lived with enough presence to notice it was beautiful all along.
This is the first, the wildest & the wisest thing I know: the soul exists & is built entirely out of attentiveness. ~ Mary Oliver
Just few observations again dear friends & provide an opinion in my world. Thank you for stopping by, I appreciate your being here. If my journey encourages you also, all is well with my soul. Looking forward to next week; this is Kenn Butler in Paradise, Nelson with best wishes.
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