A Coin in Your Pocket

In the movie, Somewhere in Time, Christopher Reeve’s character wasn’t able to achieve his goal, because when he had almost achieved his goal in his past, something from his “future” brought him back to his “present.” There was a coin in his pocket that reminded him that he was out of place; out of time.

Sometimes, we miss our goals and don’t achieve what we want because there is something that keeps reminding us that” we’re not supposed to do this”, or “we’re not supposed to have that.” We miss out on a possible “future” because of our “past.” But, more importantly, we miss out on our present. The current time we have to live life to the fullest; right here, right now.

We are on a journey in life and in order to move forward, we must have a rear view mirror approach to the past; especially things that have held us back. At the same time, we must have a windshield approach to the road signs ahead of us; markers that will get us to where we want to be. We have to look out of our windshield to see where we’re going, but we can’t focus on the signs.

We must fully embrace and experience where we are, so that we can get to the place where we want to be. As human beings, living in a world based on time, we tend to focus either on what we had or what we did in the past or what we hope to do in the future and so we miss out on what we have and where we are in the present. We can easily miss the experience of the journey: the current sights, sounds and smells, by being too focused on arriving at our destination.

I remember how I used to take trips to Chicago in my earlier days. The goal was to get there and get there fast. It took an automobile accident to let me know that: 1). it wasn’t how fast I got there, but that I got there and 2), it is okay to settle back and enjoy the ride. What I found was that by embracing the full experience of the trip, I had a more enjoyable, less stressful ride and the time seemed to go by a lot faster.

Whatever you do, wherever you find yourself on your journey in your life, embrace fully where you are and what you’re doing. Periodically glance at where you were, to let yourself know that you are moving forward and glance at the check points ahead of you to make sure you’re going in the right direction. But, don’t let the past or the future distract you from fully experiencing your present. Take the coin out of your pocket and be where you are.