{"id":179,"date":"2017-10-09T08:21:19","date_gmt":"2017-10-09T08:21:19","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/smartgirlknows.com\/?p=179"},"modified":"2018-03-05T09:29:28","modified_gmt":"2018-03-05T09:29:28","slug":"dont-cherish-every-breath","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/smartgirlknows.com\/staging\/dont-cherish-every-breath\/","title":{"rendered":"(DON’T) CHERISH EVERY BREATH"},"content":{"rendered":"

A few days ago, I was stretching at the gym after working out. I was lying there on the blue mat, with my eyes closed, thanking the heavens above that my workout was finally over and I could relax and think about what I was going to have for lunch, when suddenly, a song started blaring from the gym speakers. The lyrics were something along the lines of cherish this cherish that, cherish every breath<\/em>. And for some reason, while listening to these words which were obviously intended to relax me, I started feeling stressed.
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

Everywhere I go, someone is always talking about how important it is to be happy, enjoy every minute, cherish<\/em> every breath<\/em>. Well guess what? I can\u2019t cherish every breath because it is just way too stressful. Sometimes I am too busy to cherish, and sometimes I don\u2019t even want<\/em> to cherish because I\u2019m having the worst day ever, feeling unproductive or insecure and just waiting for the day to be over<\/em>.<\/p>\n

<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span>Yet no matter where I am, older people, and movies, and lyrics, and songs at the gym point to me with their hand over their heart and say, \u201cEnjoy every minute of your life, Raz, because one day, you\u2019ll wake up and you just won\u2019t know where the time went.\u201d I know that this message is supposed to be good, but for me, this CHERISH EVERY BREATH thing makes me feel guilty for not always being aware of moments and makes me worry that if I\u2019m not constantly feeling intensely happy, I\u2019m not living my life to the fullest.<\/p>\n

<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span>As Forrest Gump once said, \u201cLife is like a box of chocolates.\u201d And it is, isn\u2019t it? The moments in life are kind of like a diverse assortment of chocolates. There are the good ones with caramel oozing out of them, and then there are the just okay ones that you don\u2019t really remember, like hazelnut, and then there are the really gross ones with the dried fruit stuck up in there. Life\u2019s moments are sometimes delicious and sometimes, well, not. But the point is, they are what they are and maybe you don\u2019t need to cherish every single one of them, you know? Because nobody really likes the dried fruit ones anyway.<\/p>\n

So basically, the CHERISH EVERY BREATH thing doesn\u2019t work for me. But still, sometimes I say to myself, \u201cRaz, your life is great, why aren\u2019t you appreciating every moment of every day?”<\/em><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span>I\u2019ll tell you why. Because no matter who you are and what you do, life is hard sometimes. And let me make this very clear \u2013 sometimes the more perfect everything is on the outside, the more we feel like crumbling to pieces on the inside. And this \u2013 CHERISH EVERY BREATH message makes it that much harder. It\u2019s making me feel guilty that I\u2019m not ENJOYING EVERY MINUTE AND MAKING THE MOST OF IT RIGHT NOW, RAZ! It scares me because I know that one day, I\u2019ll wake up with children and grandchildren and I\u2019ll look at the young girl stretching at the gym with my hand over my<\/em> heart and tell her how time flies and how important it is for her to cherish every breath, too.<\/p>\n

But when I do become that old lady, I won\u2019t tell others to cherish EVERY breath. I\u2019ll tell them to cherish THIS breath.<\/p>\n

There\u2019s a big difference between the two.<\/p>\n

The first are the EVERY breaths. Those are the breaths we breathe in order to live. Those are the regular breaths, one breath at a time. They\u2019re the breaths we take while trying to figure out our future plans with our boyfriend. They\u2019re the breaths we don\u2019t notice while we\u2019re taking an exam. They\u2019re the breaths we take while listening to a girlfriend cry over a jerk that broke her heart. Every breath.<\/p>\n

Then, we have THIS breath. These are the breaths we take outside of regular breathing. It\u2019s a breath outside of breath, a divine moment. I have a few everyday and these are the ones I choose to cherish.<\/p>\n

Like when I\u2019m stuck in my regular everyday breathing and I\u2019m annoyed and angry that I haven\u2019t been writing as much as I would have liked or that the words I\u2019m writing just aren\u2019t working for me. And then I take a step back and look at my huge Macbook computer and my apartment and my books and realize how lucky I am to even have all of this stuff right at my fingertips. This breath.<\/p>\n

Or when I\u2019m all showered up and I snuggle into bed and really look<\/em> at Joni. I suddenly notice the smooth spot on the apple of his cheek. I see how his blonde hair glistens even in the dark. I notice the wrinkles that bunch up on the sides of his eyes when he smiles. And then I stop and think to myself, Wow, I haven\u2019t really seen <\/em>him all day.<\/em>\u00a0This breath.<\/p>\n

<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span>As an incredibly intelligent woman named Glennon Doyle Melton once taught me, you can\u2019t seize all of life, all the time. These special breaths come and go, and every time they do, I cherish them. They scare me sometimes, because when you take the time to cherish something, you really do notice how fast life goes by. I once read about a man who would go to the park everyday and lay on the grass facing the sky doing absolutely nothing. He did this with the intention of becoming so bored that he would literally feel the moments of his life go by more slowly. Since none of us have time to spend our days lying around the park, I guess there\u2019s not much we can do to stop time. But for me, stopping to cherish THIS breath is the closest thing I\u2019ve found to slowing it down, even if it\u2019s just for a moment.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Kisses,<\/p>\n

<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span>SGK<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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