Folks tend to think on how things used to be with phrases like…
- “I miss it when I was on the football team and king of my high school”
- “My spouse just isn’t the same person they were 20 years ago”
- “Ahh those college days were my golden years”
Life moves on, things change. And with each new stage of life comes a series of positive and negative changes. It’s easy to look back and over-index the positives of a particular moment in time, but completely ignore the negatives.
Just be happy to be here. Take all the positives and negatives with each age and don’t fret on how things used to be. Chances are, they never will. You’ll never be as skinny as you were in high school, you’ll never be as cool as you were in college, and you’ll have new bodily pains with every additional year alive.
At some point, the life you live today will be something you look back on admirably when you’re older.
“You see this goblet?” asks Achaan Chaa, the Thai meditation master. “For me this glass is already broken. I enjoy it; I drink out of it. It holds my water admirably, sometimes even reflecting the sun in beautiful patterns. If I should tap it, it has a lovely ring to it. But when I put this glass on the shelf and the wind knocks it over or my elbow brushes it off the table and it falls to the ground and shatters, I say, ‘Of course.’ When I understand that the glass is already broken, every moment with it is precious.”