Each Day is a Lifetime in Miniature-Daily Meditation 1.30

Today’s quotation:

Each day is a lifetime in miniature.  To awaken each morning is to be born again. To fall asleep at night is to die to the day.  In between waking and sleeping are the golden hours of the day.  What we cannot do for a lifetime, we can do for a daytime. . . .  The supreme art of living is to strive to live each day well. . . .  Live a day at a time and remember that tomorrow is another today. -Wilferd A. Peterson

Today’s Meditation:

What are you going to do with your today?  There are many possibilities, and it’s entirely your choice what you do with them.  You may have to go to work because you’ve agreed to do a specific job for pay, but how you act and the quality of the work you do are up to you and you alone.  How will you treat the other people with whom you have contact–with dignity and respect and love and compassion, or with disdain and judgment and neglect?  Will others be glad for having interacted with us, or will we have made their days less pleasant?

I may want to complete a novel sometime in the future–if I write three pages today, that dream may become a reality.  I may feel frustrated in my home because of the clutter, and an hour or three of cleaning up may be the best way to spend my day.  My mind may be racing with all sorts of problems and concerns, so the best thing I can do today may be a very long walk in a relaxing and beautiful place where I can let my mind and thoughts settle.

Sometimes we get so caught up thinking about what we want to do with our lives that we neglect to pay attention to this day, the one we’re living in right now.  And each day brings its own set of demands and dynamics–while a nice long walk may be just the thing for today, tomorrow, we may be better off sitting down at a desk and spending a few hours on a project that needs to get done.  And sometimes, I can use today to plan for tomorrow; after all, that camping trip isn’t going to plan itself.

“A lifetime in miniature.”  How will I feel tonight when I go to bed?  That all depends on how I spend this day, this fantastic gift I’ve been given.  May we all spend it well.

Questions to consider:

What things can you do today to make it a very positive day?

How do we learn to try to take care of weeks or months at a time instead of living day by day?

What does “to strive to live each day well” mean to you?

For further thought:

You wake up in the morning, and your purse is magically filled with twenty-four hours of the unmanufactured tissue of the universe of your life.  It is yours.  It is the most precious of possessions.  No one can take it from you.  It is unstealable.  And no one receives either more or less than you receive.-Arnold Bennett

If you missed Friday’s Daily Meditation, it is right here.