Living every day as if it wasn’t your last

I don’t have a bucket list, I was never very good with lists anyway and I’m definitely not very good with lasts. Lists frustrate me. I can’t seem to ever get to the bottom of them and more often or not I lose them and have to write another one — so spending more time writing lists than actually doing anything written down on them. People say that I should have a bucket list following my bout of cancer. That I should live each day of my life as though it were my last. Why wouldn’t I want one? It could be an impressive list of exciting activities that I’ve always wanted to do, should do, and could do now that death is not so imminent. What might such a list look like? Hand written on thick, beautiful paper marked with sharpies, decorated, colour coded, hand-drawn boxes to tick on completion? Or digitally recorded on my tablet / phone, with target dates for actions, audio reminders, alarms set to remind me and pins in maps for orientation? Or on a pintrest type board with images and website links and invites to view or share? Notes on places to visit, mountains to climb, sights to see, ships to be sailed, holidays to be had.

They all sound like great ideas if I was to go down that listing road, but I’m not. I have decided that instead, I should live my life as if each day isn’t my last. To believe that today’s September warmth on my skin and the fleeting glimpse of a kingfisher as I run along the riverbank will be repeated tomorrow, when I run that bank again. To believe that I will celebrate my daughters forthcoming birthday, and the one after that and after that. To plan for this Christmas and the next. To believe that I will be attending that concert I bought a ticket for that’s in six months’ time. Something to look forward to in the future, in addition to the simple pleasures in everyday life. To believe that I’m going to get to the end of that novel and not just the chapter.

That gift of time that I feel that I have been given is not one to be treated with a faint heart however or to be treated in a blasé manner. It is one to be exploited and utilized. Explored, extoled, expanded, enjoyed and experienced. I’d love to do a bungee jump and maybe if the opportunity presents, I will. It’s not that I don’t have an adventurous spirit, I’ve recently done a world record scale abseil and ridden a horse faster than I ever have before and swam with sharks in the Indian Ocean. If more opportunities like that come along then I’d be the first in line to say ‘book me in’. Those big events are amazing but so are the everyday events — the smaller things in life. The things that we usually take for granted. For me, being mindful each day of the things we do that make us smile — either inwardly or outwardly is exploiting this gift of time. To be thankful for kindness done to us or from us to others, to savour that cup of tea just before the day and all it’s chaos unfolds, to be tickled by a funny story, to laugh until you cry to drink good wine, to spend time with friends and family, to feel good about something new you’ve learned that day or done that day, to read an interesting article or book, to visit a new or revisit an old. Music, sunshine, rain, surprises… There’s a myriad of things that we experience every day that we have to thank time for. I’m doing that today and tomorrow and the next day and hopefully…a few more after that.