Live Each Day Like It's Your...First?

Chances are you've heard the phrase, “live each day like it’s your last”. A good one it is – to embrace life and your loved ones with enthusiasm, to take chances that you might otherwise not take if you knew you had many more years on this planet.

As an admitted uptight New Englander, I envy people who live that way; those who can, for example, sing a song in a meeting if it helps nail their presentation. But I’m not that person. I need another strategy

That strategy is to Live Each Day Like It’s Your First.?

No, I don’t mean that you should drink breast milk and relieve yourself in diapers. What I mean is to look at things like you’re seeing them for the first time. To question why they are the way they are. Heck, even question if they are as they appear to be. For example:

Why are maps arranged with North on top, and not the other way around??

How did cultures come to speak different languages?

Why does music move us?

Why do the veins in a leaf resemble a tree so closely??

What defines what is funny?

Why is blue such a rare color in nature?

The very act of being curious is great exercise for the brain. It’s essential for people in so-called creative fields, but equally so for those in STEM careers. It's what helped Leonardo da Vinci and others lead us out of the Middle Ages.

As an advertising creative, my own curiosity drives my desire to learn more about the brands I work on, which uncovers unique and interesting facts that could breathe extra life into an ad, and sometimes to surprise a client with something they didn’t even know about their own brand or industry (which is always more fun than singing a song, IMHO).

To be clear – I’m not saying you need to be either a ‘last day-er’ or a ‘first day-er’, and I see no reason why either one can’t involve the other. But being truly curious does require a certain amount of humility, and the patience to let the answer find you. So even if you live each day like it’s your last, it’s a good thing that that really isn’t the case. Because getting to great solutions can take time.