Enjoy Your Time

Not to be morose or anything…but we are all inhabiting this place for a finite amount of time. Right? And how we approach our “time” can make a difference in how we view our “time”. Vague, I know. Here’s what I’ve been thinking…bear with me.

It started with a newsletter that I receive from Nancy Kho of the “Thank You Project”. I read and subsequently selected her book for Book Club several years ago. Her premise was that if we write notes or letters to thank people/places/things in our lives that have impacted our life (in good ways and bad), it will increase our satisfaction in life. I read her book during our COVID shut down and had plenty of time on my hands so I tried out her theory and wrote notes of appreciation to a long list of people from my past and present. It was very satisfying for me and I hope for the recipients – at least for those people and places that could actually read them! I continue to try to practice this strategy – even if sometimes I’m just writing the note “in my head”.

In a recent newsletter from Nancy (who by the way, lives in Oakland), she shared a conversation she had with her niece who shared the “TR” concept or “Time Remaining”. Her niece had learned from a wise, “mature” Scottish woman that since “we don’t know how much time we have” (TR), she and her friends think about and talk about everything they can do with their TR. Nancy has taken “TR” as code for reconsidering her values, goals and aspirations and then changing some things in her life.

Hmmm…

Then I read a long tweet from “JD” on Memorial Day. He told the story of his “inseparable” friends sitting on a beach drinking whiskey before they each were deployed and making a pact that should any one of them die in their upcoming deployments, the others would return to this spot on the beach and toss his dog tags into the ocean. They went further and agreed that every year they’d return at sunrise and pour a shot of whiskey into the rolling waves. JD went on to share that he never imagined that he’d be the only survivor returning to the beach every year. He reflected on trying to understand why he’s been left to live his life and he wondered if he’s living a life worthy of his friends. He honors his friends by remembering that there are amazing people all around who demonstrate the “purest love” for their neighbors, who do the “right thing”, and who have an “intense capacity for kindness”. He closed his tweet by saying that he has no idea when his “number will be called” (none of us-or at least few of us do), but he will pursue a life filled with purpose and focused on the things that really matter – taking care of each other.

Sounds like he’s making the most of his TR to honor his friends.

I recently read a piece in the NYT (The Daily) that got me to thinking…The author remembered a voicemail from the neighborhood cobbler telling him that his shoes were ready to pick up. He said that the cobbler was a “grumpy guy” so the message was short and terse. But he noticed that he ended his message not with “bye” or “have a good day”. He signed off with “Enjoy your time.” He thought about that message and it made him think about the finality of “have a good day”. Should we only enjoy that day? Are there other time periods we should be striving to enjoy?

As Nancy learned through her niece, since we don’t know our “TR”, shouldn’t we be enjoying our “time”? All of our time? “Enjoy your time” seems like an excellent alternative. I’m going to try to remember that sign off.

And yesterday, I participated remotely in the Chico State University Foundation Board meeting. We closed our session with an activity called “Values Auction”. It wasn’t unlike other values clarification processes I’ve participated in (or led), but as I’ve been thinking about my TR, it caused me to think of it a bit differently. We were asked to toss out words that described why we are active members on this Board. There were many thrown onto the chart – “relationships” being a common value, but others such as compassion, education, opportunity, also rose to the top. The word I threw out was “service”. I hadn’t really thought of that word (value) as being so important to me, but as I have been reflecting on the meaning of my TR, it really felt right. “Service” describes how I want to spend my “time remaining”.

So it seems appropriate that I end with my “thank you letter to Chico State”:

It’s with a full heart – full of gratitude and joy – that I want to publicly thank Chico State for shaping me as a young adult, for providing me with opportunities to grow, for instilling a sense of purpose, for educating me academically, but also in how to work in a community with compassion and care. For teaching me how to have a good time and still get my work done. For the importance of relationships at the front of EVERY task and for helping me to stop and enjoy the beauty around me. (I mean…have you ever seen that campus? Absolutely stunning.)

Thank you to Nancy, JD, The Daily, and Chico State for helping me to reflect on my TR.

Enjoy your time!