“Your ways of being in this world are not set in stone. They are set in sand.”
This simple insight shifted something big in me today. I could feel it viscerally and I liked it! This remarkable insight came from the book, The Good Life, and it offers us both hope and a pivot point.
It’s becoming crystal clear that we are long overdue for a mental reframe of how we can move through life. It shouldn’t harden us, or lock us into a single way of being in the world. Moving through life with grace and agility should soften us and unlock us in very freeing, expansive ways.
Something that is crystallizing for me is that we spent a lot of our daily lives in time travel. We cling to the past or race to the future. All while believing we are stuck in cement in the present. Our past holds us back and the future is where we are certain we will find happiness.
Today is that future you raced toward.
Just last year, you dreamt about how happy you would be when you arrived right here. Why is it then that you aren’t feeling that magic you were so certain you’d find? What is hard for you about where you are today, in the future you so desperately wanted?
James Clear, author of Atomic Habits, tells us that we achieve real self improvement when we cast a vote for our future selves on a consistent basis. Those votes we cast, the choices we make, should be helping us become flexible and conscious about how we live in the present moment.
Yet, here we are in the present (that was once the future we envisioned) and we find ourselves feeling much the same as we did in the past. Our plates are still too full, there’s lots of competing demands for our time and attention, and we still have to be committed to quality sleep, exercise and good nutrition. We might ask ourselves – “have we moved the needle”?
It is precisely for this reason that I found the concept of “our perch in life” to be such a revelational mental image.
What if we were to think of that future we are aiming for as a perch? A resting place or a placeholder for a stage in our lives. What if we were to embrace the fact that we have “arrived” and decided to fully steep ourselves in the experience of this incredible perch?
What if we were to stay with the present, to really drop into it, and forego too much time and energy being poured into the next landing spot?
A few months ago, Dr. Laurie Santos, host of the Happiness Lab podcast, pointed out that there is a lot of advice on social media these days to just find your “purpose”. Like there’s some magic pot of joy at the end of a rainbow. You just have to find your PURPOSE. Most of us feel completely overwhelmed or self-defeated by this life advice. Who really feels like Mother Theresa or Ghandi at any stage of life? Dr. Laurie puts a gentle hand on this life advice and tells us to “right size” our purpose.
No matter our stage of life, we can have a small p purpose. One that fits just right for the present moments we are in.
What is your perch right now and what is your small p purpose on that lovely little station in life?
If you are a new parent or grandparent, your perch is one of welcoming a tiny little human into this world. Your small p purpose probably feels very much like a capital P purpose, since that little one is totally dependent on you for all their needs. And even though that responsibility asks a lot of you – you are all in. You make sacrifices that don’t feel like sacrifices at all – it just feels like love pouring out of every pore of you.
If you are a parent or grandparent of a child who has just turned double digits, I am guessing that this perch feels much different that the newborn one did. What is required of you now is finding some balance between helping and letting out enough kite string for that child to test their fledgling independence. To be fair, this balancing act is harder than the newborn stage – because it requires more conscious awareness, an honesty that this child has needs much different from your own, and that you are building trust on a whole new level. You have to learn to let go of the total control you once had. From this perch, you are both an active participant and a keen observer. Your small p purpose is evolving.
If you are a parent of an adult child, you will discover that you have a lot of perches ahead of you. Each and every stage of life from this point forward, will bring new vantage points. It is quite common for parents to commit to raising their little ones to grow into strong, independent and courageous young adults — and then not be really ready when that moment arrives. Brené Brown would encourage us to embrace paradox as the fulcrum for our perches as our roles change when our kids leave the nest. She calls this the “tenacity of paradox”.
Tenacity is the ability to have a good grasp on what is actually happening while not getting stuck in cement. This echoes the wisdom from The Good Life: our ways of being in the world are not set in stone. They are set in sand.
Take some time today to reflect about the perch you are currently sitting on in your life. What stage of life are you in and what is your most meaningful role right now in the present moment? Are you able to stay present right now in small moments and big ones – grounded in what matters most? Are you showing up as your best self for this moment that you are actually living — the one you once dreamed of with all your heart?
It is easier to stay present and align our ways of being in the world and especially in our relationships, when we use this mental image of a perch. It is such a beautiful reminder that our vantage point is unlike any other we have had in the past. We are seeing things from a very fresh perspective and our small p purpose keeps us focused on bringing our best selves to this very moment in time.
Don’t rush to get to the next perch. You’ve worked hard to get to this one. You dreamed of it, you invested in it in a million small ways every single day in the past. What you do now, each and every day, will carry you and those you love to the next perch all in due time. Make the most of the here and now.
Nothing is set in stone, but rather set in soft and shifting sand. We are strong, malleable, flexible and agile. We have wings to fly and soft places to land.
