We have no time to stand and stare….

Remember the poem by W. H. Davies called ‘Leisure’ which goes as:

"What is this life if, full of care,

We have no time to stand and stare?-

No time to stand beneath the boughs

And stare as long as sheep or cows:..."

The other day I was going out for one of my long walks and asked my husband if he would like to join me as it was a beautiful, winter morning with the sun shining bright and a cool breeze making it a perfect morning to enjoy together. He glanced over his laptop and said he is busy and needs to send urgent mails to clients. This is a regular pattern in our lives, where due to our working schedule constraints we don’t get time to do things we enjoy together. For some particular reason, I am not sure what that was, but I felt a little sad inside.

"No time to see, when woods we pass,

Where squirrels hide their nuts in grass:

No time to see, in broad daylight,

Streams full of stars, like skies at night:..."

I went for my walk but my mind was preoccupied. This had triggered some faraway memories which I had suppressed inside. I realized that in the pursuit to reach to the destination, we stopped enjoying the journey to get there. We have given up on so many small pleasures life has offered to us on a platter.. but unfortunately its in our blindspot.  

This is not just story of my life, but of most of us who think we were put on this planet to be successful – somehow the success is defined by the ladders we climb academically, the heights we scale in our careers, the dream house we all want to live in, the car we want to buy and so on. Ironically most of us have achieved most of the things in the checklist that makes us ‘successful’ but the real question to ask is ‘Are we happy?’. When is the last time we laughed together with friends and family? When have we gone on an impromptu drive to just feel the breeze in our hair? When have we sat down and played a game with the kid?

If there is a lesson to be learnt from the pandemic today is the uncertainty of it all – we can't and shouldn’t take our loved ones for granted. Life is unpredictable and they may not wait for you to be ‘free’ to spend time with them because now they will be ‘busy’ chasing some dream.

We all are guilty of procrastinating things that bring us joy – and that don’t even cost a penny – yet we think of them as not being a priority and keep telling ourselves – there will be time to enjoy that later, now I have to get this order or please this client or achieve some milestone in my career.  We slog out so much of our prime years in the hope of ‘enjoying’ when we are older and have the money, the dream house, the dream job….. and in retrospect we miss out on so many good things as well. Somehow, ‘delayed gratification’, in this context, doesn’t really make sense.

"No time to turn at Beauty’s glance,

And watch her feet, how they can dance:

No time to wait till her mouth can

Enrich that smile her eyes began?...."

Speculating what might be or what might have been is taking our focus away from what is happening now. The anticipation of ‘getting there’ is too far-fetched and can cause a lot of anxieties if the desired pace isn’t met with. By being busy all the time we are not appreciating the present enough. Do you think people who are stressed and hurried get to their goals faster and easily than if they didn’t fret so much? Think about what is at stake and what is being lost.. Your child is never going to be 5 or 10 or 15 again. You are missing out on the beautiful experiences that will form a very strong foundation of his and your years to come. The same is with your partner – as we grow older we need support and the reassurance of one another more than before – so work on it before a huge gap fills the space.. that will be difficult to fill. Don’t allow your expectations to steal your ‘now-ness’.

Life is continuously evolving and no matter how much we plan, we will always be met with unexpected twists and turns. Instead of wasting precious moments trying to control things which we have no power over, just embrace the uniqueness of the moment, adapt to it and you will actually enjoy it. Life is happening here and now… It will be too sad to look back and regret not playing ball with your kid, not taking time out for your loved ones, not catching up with friends, not having fun.....

"A poor life this if, full of care,

We have no time to stand and stare."

                          -W.H.Davies