Travel On

It's Friday!

If you are like most people in the world then this is the day you have looked forward to all week long.  From the minute you get out of bed on Monday morning, in the back of your mind you are already thinking about Friday.  We love Fridays, looking forward to the week-end when we can spend time with family, or take a trip somewhere, or attend some special event for which we got tickets months in advance already.  Whatever week-end means to you, chances are that you have been planning your activities for the week-end and have marked the passing of the days just to get to Friday.

Most of us are like this.  We have our eyes firmly locked onto our destination.  We plan it and make arrangements for it and we make sure we mark it in our diaries.  Yet somehow we forget that in between this moment and that point somewhere in the future there is a whole lot of living that still has to be done.

We are so focused on the destination that we try to bypass everything else as soon as possible.  Women the world over start counting down the months and weeks of their pregnancy from the time they find out they are pregnant.  Many forget to savor the wonder of the miracle growing within them because they are so focused on preparing for the birth.  We marvel holding that new born baby in our arms, but soon the reality settles in and we start wishing our children were older, thinking if only they could sit, talk, walk or go to school, things would get better.  Then, before we know it our children are out of the house, taking on the responsibilities for their own journey, and we realize that we were so busy chasing after the destination that we missed out on so much of their daily development.

Often people are so busy getting to that point in life when they can say that "I have arrived" that they miss out on the beauty of life right now, at this very moment.  They chase after that point in time, that "ultimate" destination with so much energy that they are too exhausted to cope, let alone, enjoy the present.  They falsely believe that real living can only happen once you get "there", once you have that six-figure paycheck, that mansion in the posh neighbourhood, a luxury yacht, that sought after trophy, etc, etc, etc.  Newsflash:  That moment, that destination is only a little moment in time, a tiny fraction of life.  When you reach that "arrival point", when all your life has revolved about getting "there", you discover that it does not hold all the satisfaction which you expected, because the price you paid for it was too high.  That is when you look for the next destination, the next goal, mistakenly believing again that it would satisfy your needs. It becomes a constant chasing after wind.  Life has got very little to do with the destination, but everything to do with the journey.

It is so important to realize that we are all travelers, we are all busy with a journey.  We are never alone on the road, and when we reach out to our fellow travelers along the way, we can help and encourage one another, and we can make the journey so much more enjoyable.  We are not simply moving from point A to point B in a void or a vacuum, no we are passing through some amazing scenery, take a moment to relish it.  Enjoy the ride.  Every journey we undertake is filled with life lessons.  We might experience uphills and detours, sometimes a few potholes along the way, but there are also long and easy downhills with beautiful vistas ahead, places we can rest and replenish our souls.

It is very good and very necessary to know where we are going, and it is important to have a road map of how to get there, but never forget that it is the journey that is the most important, and every journey is what we make it.  

Happy Travelling.