Worry, oh worry…unfortunately worry is a state I live in many of my days.  I worry that I have offended somebody.  I worry that my kids are being included and involved.  I worry that I am making the right decisions and I worry about worrying so much.

I remember a day long, long ago (my husband and I were dating) and we were tubing down a river here in Montana.  We had gone over a couple of riffles, no big whitewater or anything, but of course I was worried that it was going to get worse.  One of the friends we were with shouted “This is nothing!  The BIG water is down lower.” So I spent the rest of the trip fretting about what was to come.  He was kidding.   There was no BIG water.  But I spent the entire float waiting for something terrible to happen.  Worried about something that was never going to be.

I have in the past wished that I could see the future just to know that everything was going to be okay.  But then I thought that maybe in 20 years everything is not going to be okay and I wouldn’t want to know THAT!  So I have decided that six hours is the window of time into the future which I would like to see.  Six hours covers almost every plane ride that I have to go on.  Six hours usually is the amount of time that I don’t see my teenager if he goes out, so I would know if he makes it back okay.  Six hours would cover just enough so that I would not have to worry about the immediate future, but I would not have to live with the knowledge of some tragedy for the next 20 years.

Living in the present, the right now, is such a difficult thing to do.  For example, I am terrified of flying.  And often on a plane ride if I am in turbulence I have to think moment by moment, all is okay right now.  Like this exact second, everything is okay.  I also have several mantras I repeat to myself and no one is allowed to talk to me or touch me, but that it a blog post all to its own.

Anyway, taking things moment by moment will be a goal of mine for this gift of a Gap year.  My mom always calls it borrowing trouble.  Don’t borrow trouble.  It’s great advice and some I am trying to follow.  Don’t create scenarios is your mind which probably will never happen.  The BIG water you are worried about may just be a gentle current.  So breathe into the current and smile xxoo