Philosophies.......Life......(29 days)

Why should it be that it seems going from 30 days to 29 is so much bigger a 'thing' than going from 31 to 30??!

So.....life......what's it all about?....why are we here?......surely these questions are some of the great mysteries of......life!

Some of the greatest minds have attempted to define it:

• Life is beautiful (Vincenzo Cerami)
• '42' (Douglas Adams)
• Life's short (Warwick Davis)
• Life is hard (Pretty much everyone at sometime or another)
• Life ain't easy (Dr. Hook)
• Life is like a box of chocolates (Forrest Gump)
• Life is a tale, told by an idiot; full of sound and fury, signifying nothing (Shakespeare, chirpy old chap isn't he??)

I'm with Vincenzo, and amazingly I have to disagree with the great bard himself. I hope you have worked out by now that I am essentially a person who believes in not only positivity, but also the power of positive thinking; I therefore find it very hard to identify with such a pessimistic attitude to life. It goes so much against my grain. I guess what Shakespeare is trying to say is that the impact one person's life has on the world is so diluted by the world entire that it really does not matter what they do; it makes no difference.

Poppycock. If we all thought that then no one would strive for anything, no one would inspire us, we would never inspire others, hell; I wouldn't even be typing about weight that I couldn't be bothered losing, exercise that I couldn't be bothered doing, and a marathon that didn't exist because no one could be bothered running it.

......and yes; I am aware that I have used the word 'poppycock'. I won't do it again; I promise. Balderdash however, now that is a different matter.

So what is my secret of life? Two words; that's all, two words which came to me at one of those times when life was hard. No, let me rephrase that; life was hard, but I couldn't remember why; yes, really, not a clue. It kind of went like this......

Something bad (I feel bad) followed by several things which ordinarily wouldn't be that much of a problem but were magically magnified by my own negative mood (I feel worse) creating a downward spiral of miserable moodiness (worse still) which persisted even when the original bad thing was dealt with, EVEN; when the original bad thing was forgotten. All I was left with was a whirlpool of negativity which I never even thought about getting out of; I even found myself walking with a slight stoop.

It was the stooping which woke me up, as I suddenly saw myself - felt myself - doing it. After getting over the shock, I reverse-traced the above paragraph (still couldn't remember what the original problem was), and had no rational explanation for feeling the way I was feeling. I was angry; not at life - quite the opposite - the anger was directed at myself, for wasting life. I would never get those days back.

Surely, whatever someone's philosophy of life may be, it can't include becoming and staying miserable can it? There is just no sense in it. Whether life goes on past what we can prove, whether life is all there is, whether the echoes of our lived life eventually cease resonating, surely it is the right thing to endeavour to make our lives a positive experience for ourselves and the world around us?

It is something I realised right at that moment, and the two words I wrote on my little blackboard/noticeboard as a result - nearly twenty years ago - stand there still and will always serve as a reminder during those times my mind and spirit falters......

'Enjoy it'

Seventeen miler tomorrow......another chilly day, just how I like it!!