Have you thought about how much time you actually spend with the people you love? Maybe work or chores take precedence over spending quality time?
Have you thought about not having those people in your life?
What if everyone you loved suddenly disappeared? How well would you deal with the pain and loneliness of no longer hearing their voice or touching their face? It’s so important to make time for those you love.
LIFE IS SHORT
We all have heard the phrase “life is short”, and there is nothing truer. I was young when I had a daughter, actually, I may have been too young at only 17. I grew up fast and worked a whole lot, just to make sure that my daughter had what she needed.
Unfortunately, all of the hours I spent working and my childish mindset didn’t give me much room to be the dad that I should have been. It’s really hard to admit that. Sure, I spent time with my little girl on the weekends that I had her and every Tuesday evening for dinner. She grew up so fast and before I knew it she was graduating high school, graduating from college, and now she’s a firefighter with a crazy work schedule and living her own life.
My oldest son is almost 20 and although I got to spend a little more time with him than I did with my daughter, the time slipped away yet again.
Spending time with my grandparents on holidays was one of my favorite things to do. I lived several hours away, so it was difficult to see them as often as I would have liked. However, when I think back, I could have made more time for them. I could have taken at least one weekend a month to drive to them to hang out for a day, but my priorities weren’t in the right place.
Maybe I had plans to drink with my friends, hang out with my kids, work over a weekend, I guess there was always some excuse of why I couldn’t see them. What I should have been doing was making excuses for why I needed to see them.
MAKING TIME
It is up to us to make time with the people we love. We can’t say, “Well, they never make the effort to call me”, because it isn’t up to them if you want to have a relationship with them.
Whoever said that relationships are 50/50 is dead wrong. Everyone needs to give 100%, otherwise, we would all just be talking to ourselves. I am typically the one who calls my mom. If I didn’t I probably wouldn’t hear from her very much. She always tells me she would like me to call because she doesn’t want to bother me. My problem is that I get easily distracted and I oftentimes forget to call even when I make plans to do so.
As I write this post, it is giving me a reason to reflect on my own life. And honestly, there is nothing more important in the world than the people that mean the most to us. Instead of making excuses for why we can’t reach out, we need to start making excuses for why we can. Even if it is an inconvenience we need to figure out how to do it.
CHALLENGE
I am going to challenge myself to take just two hours a day to take the time to call my mom, dad, kids, and family, give my little boy a bath or read him a story, go on a walk with my fiancée or talk to her about her day.
I am challenging myself to be less involved with work at the end of my shift and turn my focus on the people that mean the most to me. One day they won’t be here and I don’t ever want to live with the regret of having missed out on moments that I had control over and chose not to for whatever reason.
This post may seem like more of a self-reflection on my own life, but I’m hoping that you can take something away from it too. Challenge yourself to be a better man and make time for the people you love and who love you.
Start living your life like today is your last day on the planet and make sure that everyone knows how much you mean to them.