Ah, the age old celebration of a birthday. Recently, I had one of those landmark birthdays people often celebrate or dread in a big way. Looking back over the few days surrounding the birthday, the interesting part was people’s reactions. In one group of parents, I was clearly one of the youngest people in the room. They all looked at me and made comments about, “How young you are“; “You still have a long way to go“; and a few comments about how old they were. Another group I was with was asking a lot about “What it was like to be xx years old? How does today feel different?”
When I woke up on the day of my birthday, nothing felt different (and never did I expect it to). After all, a day only feels bad when you’ve let yourself down or experienced loss. A day feels FANTASTIC when
- You’ve made a positive impact or put in effort to do so.
- Watched your loved ones experience joy or success.
- Know you helped improve another person’s day (puts you back at “made a positive impact“).
When you get to make a positive impact by helping your loved ones experience joy, that day feels especially wonderful. Thus, the magic of parenting and/or mentoring. For me, I wake up expecting a fantastic day each day.
What will you do today to give reason to celebrate? Who will you impact in the greatest of ways? Will you do so through the work you do for a living or through time you will put in outside of work? Will you do so by the time you spend with your children or through time spent with someone you mentor? After all, every day is a birthday (whether it is 14,600 days since your birth or 27,375 days since your birth). This year, you have 365 more days to create amazing experiences. How will you create a plan each day to have a moment before bedtime to reflect and know you’ll be able to say, “Today, I had a fantastic day because . . .?”
If you have a system, share with us by “Leaving a Comment” on this post. In our efforts to create change through Asking First, Being a Friend, and Opening a Door, we LOVE to hear life approaches others have found to be productive and rewarding. By sharing with us today, you will have insured you have an “Aha” moment to reflect on at the end of today – because you will have helped others.
P.S. A “Shout Out” goes to my family who threw a nice, intimate, and really fun “Surprise Party” for me. The joy of the party came in spending time with people I love and knowing we were all having fun together. For my wife and sons who spent some “ice cream” time with me yesterday before I had to fly out, THANKS. You are the best! 🙂
Yes, which birthday I had is not revealed in this post on purpose. After all, does it change anything? Now, the day I have TODAY (and beyond) could and SHOULD produce change.