I was telling my boys about a story I read. It was about a lady who was recalling with great fondness how, when she was little, her dad was always available to her. She recalled peeking into his office, so as to not disturb him. Upon seeing her, he would always say "I see you...come here..." She would run over to him, he would pick her up and place her on his lap and say, "tell me about your day". That was all she needed to start gushing about the bug that got on her, or her friend that wasn't nice to her or the ice cream she got to eat!
I always make it a point to share inspiring stories with my boys in the hope of teaching them something. I like to make them think or perhaps more accurately, get a sense of their thought process, so I asked, "What do you think?" My boys are are extremely insightful, so often times, I'm the one who ends up with the lesson and today was a perfect example of that.
I could tell Matthew was thinking and I've learned to be patient with that. Finally, he said, "That's a very nice memory she has and I was thinking that the only way a parent could do that is if they never leave things for the last minute.
I literally gasped for several reasons. One, because I am so guilty of leaving things for the last minute and I KNOW that if I'm in the middle of doing something at the last minute, I cannot afford to be interrupted by anyone, for any reason....yes, even my kids. The other reason was that I would have never thought that through to an actual action step. It was have remained a fantasy, a nice idea, but I would have never made that connection.
It made me think about the fact that when I leave things for the last minute, I don't enjoy what I am doing. I am in a hurry....in a hurry to do the laundry, in a hurry to take a shower, in a hurry to walk across the parking lot, in a hurry to get my nails done, in a hurry to do everything! This not only results in me not being to stop to attend to something my boys need, but it has also resulted in my not enjoying 90% of what I am doing and...it has also resulted in me not doing my best. How could I...when I'm in a hurry to get it done?
Multi-tasking is a trap many of us have fallen into. We even brag that we, women, can multi-task better than men. Well, I'm here to say, that multi-taksing is not all it's built up to be. Multi-tasking is, after all, the reason we lose our keys, or as we get older, the reason we leave the stove on. We are not focused on what we are doing. We are focused on our next "to do" item on out list.
I say we slow down and learn to enjoy each and everything we do. Ask yourself, "Am I enjoying this moment?" If you didn't find a close parking spot, enjoy your walk across the parking lot. Be grateful you can walk across the parking lot. If your child sees a bug they find intereseting you'll be able to stop and look at it, thereby filling their love cup vs. emptying it with "come on, we don't have time for that".
