Are you waiting for the future to load or are you loading it?

One of the cool things about life is we get to imagine our futures. We get to dream of that dream job, we get to work toward that big race, we get to imagine how many kids we'll have and all that they'll grow up to be. As long as there is a tomorrow we get to imagine what it will look like. 

Yet, one of the challenges in life is - wait for it - we get to imagine our futures. 

In times like these, when few people are living the future they imagined for themselves even a month ago, it's easy to get buried beneath the weight of crushed hopes and dreams - or, beneath futures that look at least momentarily derailed. 

It's easy to fall into a waiting pattern. It's easy to sit back and stare at the screen and wait with some anguish for our futures to reload. 

These are challenging times. And I get a bit of that falling into a waiting pattern. But I read something Ryan Holiday wrote yesterday and it hit me. He said, "So many people are busy thinking about the future that they miss the opportunities right in front of them. We think the future is something that happens, rather than something we make."

I keep going back to the very first sermon I heard at the beginning of my own personal social distancing experience. The pastor said, "unprecedented times provide unprecedented opportunities." He was talking about opportunities to help others, but I think God might also be giving some of us opportunities to re-imagine our personal futures. 

Holiday also said, "life is constantly asking us, "is this going to be alive time or dead time?"

Right now, I think it's easy to choose dead time. I think it's easy to fall into a pattern of just managing things, of trying to hold things together the best we can until the future reloads itself. Choosing alive time, however, says I'm going to use this time to make something of my future that would have never been possible without this day and this time. 

I want to encourage you to use this time as alive time. Instead of focusing on what the future will or won't look like, focus on shaping it into something you never imagined it could be. I encourage you to imagine that future day - when we return to "normal" - and identify something you want to look backwards and say you did or can now do that you wouldn't have been able to do without the challenge you just left behind. 

What will that something be for you?

A book you never thought you'd read or write. 

A blog you never thought you start.

A skill you never thought you'd learn (online learning is more open and available than ever).

A friend you never thought you'd make. 

A recipe you never thought you'd master.

A business plan you never thought you'd write.

A video you never thought you'd be brave enough to share. 

What will that something be for you?

I think now is the time to be creating gratitude. Now is the time to create that thing or that experience or that opportunity that when this day of "normal" returns, you'll look back and say, man am I thankful for the chance to.........
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Today's a perfect day to get away from the screen and a future you're waiting to load - and do one thing to load it. Our collective futures will really amount to a ripple effect of how many of us choose to answer alive time instead of dead time.