Every Passing Minute Is A Chance To Turn
It All Around
by: Maria E. Andreu
Every passing minute.
When I
first heard this line, in the movie Vanilla Sky, it struck a powerful chord in
me. Sure, it’s a sentiment I’d heard countless times before, that at any given
moment you could set changes in motion that would alter the course of your
life. But something about the phrasing. Every passing minute. It’s immediate, it’s powerful, it’s crucial and present. It’s right this minute.
It
doesn’t break your destiny into flows of days or months. It’s not, “This month
you could change everything.” What is a month anyway, an amalgam of moments and
days, good moods and bad, energy and lethargy? A month is impossible to get
your arms around, impossible to master and control. Even a day has that vast
quality, with its moments of sadness and hope and the many mundane things that
we artificially lump into a whole.
But a minute. This minute. This
passing minute. Right now.
It’s
the only thing we control and the one thing we overlook so completely and
consistently. We spend our days thinking and dreaming of the future, or
dreading what’s to come, and regretting and remembering days gone by. And in
the process we forget this precious minute, this lovely second, the one in
which you move and breathe. Right now.
Right
now, you could get up from where you are and you could leave everything behind.
You could buy a one-way plane ticket and go somewhere new. Right now you could
call that person you haven’t talked to in years. Right now you could propose
that crazy idea to your boss or to that company you want to work for, or to
that person you’ve imagined could finance your dream. Right now you could seek
out a homeless person and have a conversation over a meal. Right
now.
Of
course you probably won’t do any of those things. You’ll probably keep doing
whatever you were doing a minute ago, and what you’ll be doing next minute. The
only thing that’s certain about this minute is that it’s passing. It’s passing
you by and will never be back.
Accepting
and understanding that truth fully gives you a fluidity, a momentum, like
understanding that one day the body you now cherish and inhabit will no longer
have motion and breath or the pulse of life. At first blush this may seem counterintuitive,
that knowing you’ll die and that this minute will never come should paralyze
and frighten you. But, contemplated fully, it will actually give you energy and
drive like nothing else. Because measured against that stark and immovable
truth, all the things that hold you back are puny and inconsequential. A disapproving mate or family. Financial
circumstances. Even all the collected and disjointed moments which you
regard as your “past” actually pale and tremble at this truth. One day all this
will be nothing.
And
still you have this passing minute.
It is
your only hook, the thing you can grab onto to seek out joy and fulfillment and
fame and stardom. This passing minute.
Every
passing minute is a chance to turn it all around. Just what can you grab and
turn around in this one tiny minute anyway? Possessed with the image of
stopping an oncoming truck, grabbing it by a corner and physically turning it
around, you may imagine the puniness of this minute compared with the
screeching 18-wheeler that is where you’ve been and where you’re going. How can
you grab hold of that in this one tiny, fragile passing minute?
But the
truth is that this passing minute is all we have. If your life has been a
speeding 18-wheeler bent on destruction, only right now can you do anything
about it.
But how? First, by deciding, and that’s a powerful action you can take at
this very moment. You can decide. Decide you’ll be rich, or that you’ll leave
this miserable job, or this mate that makes you feel unhappy and alone. Don’t
worry about how that will happen, because it won’t happen in this passing
minute, but in a collection of minutes, as the result of actions taken in
sequence. But the decision comes right now. Quickly! The minute is passing.
Then in
this minute, the one that follows the minute in which you made your decision,
you will outline what you need to do. Perhaps you can complete your whole dream
right in this minute. Perhaps you can walk into your boss’ office and resign
right now. But chances are you’ll need to plan, make another series of
decisions.
And of
those plans, at least
One thing. Now. Action vs.
contemplation. The crux of the matter, the difference between people who
consider themselves happy and contented vs. those who are thwarted and
resentful is that the happy ones acted, simply acted, while the thwarted ones
contemplated. It doesn’t even matter is the action is “right,” or causes the
intended result, just that it ends the inertia and fuzziness of inaction.
Every
passing minute is a chance to turn it all around. Where will you take this
minute? What decision will you make? What action will you take that will lead
you down the path you desire? One thing. Right now. Go do it.
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About
The Author Maria
E. Andreu is a coach who helps people get brave –
and live big. Her interactive blog, Living Undaunted, is a place where you
can get links to some of the coolest sites on the net for getting stuff done
(big dreams and mundane every day “gotta get it done” stuff), get access to
free resources and more. Find it at http://mariaeandreu.typepad.com/livingundaunted/.
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