A Wasted Day

During a media interview this morning, I heard a man say, "A day without a memory is a wasted day."  He really grabbed my attention.

Almost simultaneously I had two follow-on thoughts:

1. Most of my days are consumed with almost mindless routine.
2. In order to have a day that isn't wasted, I will have to find something memorable in the sea of routine days.  At least for some moment during the day, I will have to be conscious of something that is memorable.

I have to admit, I had this sinking feeling that many years of my life must have been wasted with the same routine.  Get up, bathe, brush my teeth, do my make-up, stretch, make coffee, make oatmeal, race out the door so I am not late.  Once I get to work, there is another routine.  At 7:30 I boot up the computer.  While that is happening, take my lunch to the refrigerator and maybe go to the restroom. Then settle in to answer dozens of emails before I start into back-to-back meetings.  You get the point. My whole day is that way.  Somewhere around 5:30, I sink into my chair and think that I really ought to do some creative work, but usually that is dismissed because I am too tired to be creative.

There are exceptional days. In fact this has been an exceptional week. On Tuesday, I received an award for a piece of change management work of which I am very proud--three years of focus...and someone noticed. Wednesday was annual performance review time, and for the first time in five years, I felt like someone actually noticed my work.  (Could it be because of the award I received the day before?) On Thursday, my favorite teammate--and maybe my best-ever co-worker--left our organization to take a different job.  Friday my retina specialist reported that the impact of my surgery 15 months later has been sustained. I also received an apology that meant a lot. Today I had lunch with a friend, and we talked a lot. Then, I started cleaning off my desk--now that is an endeavor worth remembering.

The funny thing about this exceptional week is that when I started to write this, I thought, "I can't even remember yesterday, except that I know I didn't stop."  Then I focused on each day and discovered it had been a week of pretty memorable days.  I think that in order to have memories we have to focus our intention on giving attention to what is memorable.  I have to choose to make a memory.  Without this thought, I might have let this week slip by like so many others--lots of wasted days.

It also occurs to me that I might even mix up the routine a little bit and create so memories.

So, tomorrow, I will choose a memory.  Monday I will choose a memory.  In the process, I will assure that my life is not wasted, but instead is rich with memories.