Today’s blog is dedicated to creating experiences. What does this mean? It means that we need to stop and take moments to create experiences that make us smile, breath, or find joy…to create good memories or make ourselves proud.
I recently had the privilege to go on a vacation with my family. We experienced new things, faced our fears and laughed a lot. It got me thinking that we spend so much time comparing ourselves to others, or working hard to buy our kids overpriced gifts, or getting caught up in the pressure of being perfect. And when we get caught up in this cycle, we end up getting upset or feeling like a failure when things don’t go our way.
Everything we do is an experience, but do we pay attention, do we take time out and really listen to the story we are creating?
For part of the vacation, we were up in the mountains, with no internet. It was fabulous. I called it our technology detox. My kids got to be out in nature, noticing small things that we don’t normally pay attention to. We heard the birds chirping in the morning, and, as we were hiking, saw a small, beautifully bright orange salamander and a rainbow from a mountain top.
It was a trip I know we will not forget. We all got to add this awesome experience to our life story. This was a big trip, but we can also have small experiences as well. Creating experiences can be big or small endeavor. To me small experiences are about creating moments of joy or moments of quiet or moments that make us smile.
Small experiences that we might add to our life story can be dinner time with the family, singing in the car by yourself — whatever brings a smile to your face. Another small but significant experience might be waking up the day after a failure, getting out of bed and moving forward anyways.
We make a choice to learn from our experiences, even the ones that bring us to our knees.
In my opinion, experiences make life interesting, exciting, and strengthen us if we choose to slow down and enjoy them. I know in some moments, we feel pain or we don’t think all experiences are interesting; however, we again choose to listen to the lesson or gift all life experiences given us.
I really wanted to focus on how to pause and appreciate the experiences that are in our lives whether they are big or small. If you have found yourself tired, exhausted, feeling like you are trying to play catch up with everyone else, comparing yourself to others when you know you shouldn’t compare…stop for a moment.
Breathe and start thinking about the experiences in life that make you strong, give you energy, help you smile and write them down so you can remember on days that you are feeling down.
Pull out pictures on your phone of the experiences that you hold dear to your heart and know you have the power to create awesome experiences in your life even every day.
Here are some ideas for creating experiences whether they are big or small
- Make your bucket list and hang it up on your wall.
- Create a ritual of connection with your partner, spouse, good friend or family member. A ritual can be a special dinner, a phone call at the same time every week, a hug or a walk.
- Find something that makes you smile everyday, even in low days, find that way to smile.
- Think back to your favorite vacation: what was it that you liked the most about that experience? Write down the answer and find ways to bring that back into your life, whether it’s on a small scale or big one. For example, this last trip I enjoyed taking my kids and doing something they had never done before. That doesn’t mean I have to take them on big vacation to try something new. We can create a new healthy meal together, go explore a new area in our neighborhood, read a new book or even play a new board game. The point is we make trying something new a priority and enjoy the experience together.
- Write down small goals you want to work toward in meeting your bucket list and/or your small experiences you want to create every day.
- Enjoy not only the experience but also the journey.
Life is a gift and so are the experiences that we create in our lives, and the journey it takes us on.
Have fun, learn from, and appreciate all the experiences life gives us and the stories they create in our book of life.