33 Reminders for Living
Birthday traditions and birthday reflections
If I can, I spend my birthday near water. The recipe remains the same: a cooler filled with sandwiches, pickles, and quart jars of homemade lemonade. Another bag carries chips, towels, books, and some sort of sweet treat. Sometimes iced coffee makes the cut, and always I drag along some kind of floatie. On the best birthdays, the day stays hot and sunny enough to roast me on the sand until the heat drives me to the water where I float until the body turns soggy.
This year, it clouded over and rained on my birthday. In the days leading up to Sunday, I checked the weather several times a day, hoping for a change in the forecast. When none had yet arrived the day before, I knew I had to accept that this year’s celebration would look different. Like most things, it ended up being exactly what I needed.
After sleeping in, J and I drove to a farmer’s market and did our morning run around the park with the dog before perusing the aisles. That morning marked day 100 running every day for me, a completely unplanned yet sweet coincidence. We finished, exhilarated and dripping in sweat. After chugging water and hydrating the dog, we entered the market, and the weather instantly shifted and did so dramatically.
One minute the sun was shining, the next, fog moved in. I glanced up as we walked on to see the trees shrouded in mist, the air heavy with the scent of rain. Excited chatter rang up and down the stalls as fellow shoppers rushed to finish their purchases. The wind picked up right as the cold front pushed in, whipping from us so quickly the heat of the morning. We stopped walking, looked at each other, and laughed at the wild timing of it. It felt like nature smiled upon me, blessing me right upon finishing my 100th run on my 33rd birthday. A delight. A mundane miracle!
We loaded up on market goodies and then stopped for coffee and bagels before heading back home to rest. We made a brief attempt to rally in the afternoon, leaving the house for books and boba tea but I quickly grew exhausted of the outing and yearned for home, where we snacked and lazed on the couch for hours more. It was an incredibly nonchalant birthday, full of rest and reflection. Absolutely perfect.
Because my birthday falls right near the middle of the year, I tend to use it as a chance to check in. Similar to the beginning of the year, I reflect, journal, and plan. What emerged this year was a list of 33 reminders for living.
1. Visit the bonfire of your many selves. Become worthy of them.
2. Prioritize movement. Your mental health needs it every day.
3. Remember: a sandwich at the beach cures most ailments. So too a step into an icy winter stream.
4. Endure the seasons. Sink into each one and be open to the gifts and wisdom they each bring.
5. Use your energy wisely; no one can protect it but you.
6. Return to the trees often. They never lie, and if you let them, those half-elder, half-god beings will tell you everything you need to know about living well.
7. Stop trying to make a one-size-fits-all approach work for relationships. It barely even works for hats!
8. Spend the extra dollar to get it locally; it’s never a waste to invest in your community.
9. Don’t try to explain yourself; your choices don’t need to make sense to anyone but you.
10. Keep trying new things. Expand your exposure.
11. Buy the art. Frame it and hang it up.
12. Extend the benefit of the doubt often; it’s one of the best gifts you can give to another human.
13. Lean into nuance, the gray, the in between. Live there, learn there.
14. Don’t forget that generosity is sexy. Be generous with yourself, too.
15. Learn from the birds. Just like the trees, they have much to teach.
16. Stop being so afraid of being cringe. That is the only thing that’s truly cringe.
17. Also: Embrace being redundant and cliché and saccharine. Who cares?!
18. Let yourself be amazed, delighted by mundane miracles. They’re everywhere, in everything.
19. Don’t be so busy listening that you forget to speak. And when you get a chance to speak, don’t forget to return the gift of listening.
20. Know the difference between which opinions to share and which to save.
21. Begrudge not the sadness, but also do not suffer needlessly.
22. Go to sleep and try again tomorrow.
23. Stay close to water. There you’ll find healing.
24. Keep your space tidy and your brain will exhale.
25. Don’t save your good candles, expensive perfume, or treasured stories for later. Later never arrives so use it up before it goes stale.
26. See people. Really look at them, and try to see them. Once you think you understand, look again.
27. Invite others in to see you.
28. Embrace honesty, always honesty above all else.
29. Be willing to be wrong. Be willing to admit it.
30. Stay tuned in to your gut. Let your intuition lead you.
31. Remake your life as many times as you want, as many times as you need. Endless drafts—revise, remake, revise, remake. The only deadline is death.
32. Remain open to what may come and welcome the change.
33. Hold it all loosely. Nothing is guaranteed.
Love defined. "And when you get a chance to speak, don’t forget to return the gift of listening."
I want to like this 1000 times.