So, as part of my One Little Word project this month, I’m to pick something, it could be anything, and practice it once a day for the entire month. At first, I was disappointed. I’d just spent the month of January trying to “practice” about a million different things; not drinking; not eating sugar; running at every workout; getting enough sleep; getting enough water . . . you get the idea. Then, as I saw how excited other people on this journey were about the task, I started to get a bit excited too . . . after all, we were given a checklist and I do love to check things off . . .
So, after MUCH thought, I decided that each day I would practice finishing off my “picture of the day” albums. You see, I’ve spent the last SEVEN years taking a photo of my kids every day. The problem is, most of these photos aren’t in albums. As in the photos stopped getting into albums around the time my daughter was born, which means I’m about five years behind on this project. Finally seeing at least some of this project completed would bring me a serious amount of JOY.
But then I went to the gym this morning. At the end of class, the teacher suggested that as we go through our day, before we react, we ask our selves:
“What would love do?”
After getting home and settling down with my lunch in front of the computer to get working on my picture of the day albums, the mail arrived. The loud thud as it hit the ground meant a package had arrived; and indeed it had. All the photos I ordered to complete the first of my daughter’s week in the life album had arrived! (A few months ago, I wrote about how I had a serious amount of guilt about not creating a week in the life album for my daughter like I had for my son, and that maybe I was finally ready to tackle it. Well, I decided that I would create the album during the course of her 5th year, so every 3 months, I’ll be documenting one week of her/our lives.)
And I was instantly torn. I WANT to get this week of my daughter’s album done . . . but I have limited time to devote to my “practice”, so I also WANT to dutifully go and work on my photo of the day albums like I promised myself I would.
“What would love do?”
So I sat down, tore open the envelopes of photos and got to work on my daughter’s album.
As much as I want to make progress on my annual albums, that’s not where the love needed to go today.
This doesn’t mean I’m giving up on my Practice February though . . . nope. It just means that for the rest of the month, when faced with a decision, I’m going to pause and ask myself what love would do. I’m pretty sure that as long as I stick to it, I’ll find lots of JOY along the way.
On that note, I’ve got some photos to sort through!
nancyhotson 