Every day seems to be a race against the clock. We, especially as Americans and students and workers, divide up our time. We are always on a strict schedule with no chance for alterations or spontaneity. We have a routine. Most days are the same, and when we change them up to go to that party or attend that meeting, we write it in on our calendar weeks in advance so we may better allot our time.
We’re rushed. Traveling from place to place, frustration rises to the surface and threatens to burst at the seams with each red light. I’m late. I’ll be fired. I’ll get a detention. My friends will think I’m rude. I’m ruined.
It’s stressful, it’s boring, and I’m sick of it. This in and out, get up, do the things you normally do, go to sleep. We always can’t wait for this day to be over so we can get to the next so that one can be over so we can get to the weekend. But I’ve had enough.
We shouldn’t wish our days away. We shouldn’t want the day to be over. The night will just overwhelm us as we wake up to repeat the same thing each day.
Yes, I may be a dreamer, but I’m not impractical. I know we can’t all quit our jobs or drop out of school just to restructure our daily lives. We can’t just take a vacation to the beach for a week. Money has to be made, jobs have to kept, and a random vacation is far from any type of panacea for the boredom and monotony we face.
Sometimes we just have to slow down. Breathe. It’s hard. I’m a high-strung and easily stressed person. I know it’s hard. But it’s time to try. It’s time to take up my parents on the invitation to talk to them even when I would normally be doing my homework at that hour. I refuse to push my friends aside when they’re hurting even if it means losing some sleep. Maybe I’ll take more of my afternoons to talk to my brother when I would usually stand around chatting with my friends.
Everything has its time and its place, but nothing in our daily lives has to be so constant, so stagnant and immobile. We’re human beings. We deserve to take time to ourselves, to slow down and enjoy life for what it is and what it can be. We deserve serenity, a love for our present instead of a dread for our future.
Serenity Prayer by Reinhold Niebuhr
God grant me the serenity
To accept the things I cannot change;
Courage to change the things I can;
And wisdom to know the difference.
Living one day at a time;
Enjoying one moment at a time;
Accepting hardships as the pathway to peace;
Taking, as He did, this sinful world
As it is, not as I would have it;
Trusting that He will make all things right
If I surrender to His Will;
So that I may be reasonably happy in this life
And supremely happy with Him
Forever and ever in the next.
Amen.
