Right now I am sitting and waiting in an airport. Yes, like everyone else who travels from time to time—I hate waiting in airports. Well, I have a couple hours to kill and I might as well do something constructive. Come to think of it, when we look back over our life, where we are now is simply the result or the sum total of what we did with our free time. Yes, that is very, very, very true. If life does not teach us anything else, it teaches us that in the end, the time we wasted, invested, or even watch go by will tell on us in the end. It tells on us physically, psychologically, mentally, and emotionally. What we did with our free time—just free time. I won’t even get into what we did with our time in general. Ha, ha, ha, it is funny and yet tragic to sit here and think about it. Before I decide what to write today (because I am sort of torn at this time), I have to warn you that today I am just going to let my thoughts flow for a while. Today my writing is probably more for me than anyone else. So, sometimes when I may sound a bit preachy or like I am lecturing you all, in all actuality I feed off of these words and advice as much as anyone else. Back to time, time… time… wow, as I write this I think of all the time I have wasted. I am in my mid-thirties now and my age means more to me than it ever has. I mean, I am not getting old or anything like that. But at this stage in a man’s life, some things have to die. Then there are other things that he was always told to think about, but his youth and the recklessness that goes along with it, causes him to continuously put it off. Now, now is the time to take those things off the mental backburner and examine them. Then you start telling yourself, “Wow, how did I not think about this for so long? How stupid could I be?” Then you get into “catch-up mode.” Oh yes, some of you all know exactly what I am talking about. It happens in your thirties. You generally piss away your twenties between good times and procrastination. Then when you start getting a gray hair or two, see someone you grew up with miles ahead of you, or have a sobering/life-changing experience and your eyes start to open and you say, “I gotta get myself together. I can’t believe I have wasted so much time.” This is how “catch-up mode” begins. Catch-up mode causes people to consider going back to school to finish what took them twice as long to get halfway through what they should completed twice in half the time (ha ha ha—get it). Catch up mode is triggered when all your homeys or home-girls are married--and on their second kid and you are still excited by and dipping in and out of one-night-stands and hit-and-run episodes. You think of all the good men and women you passed up or could not commit to and you keep kicking yourself. Catch-up mode makes you look at that dead end job you work, just because you are too lazy to get a job that will pay you more but requires more effort and expects you to be on time. Catch up mode also makes you realize that the only reason you work there is because your “friend with benefits” works there too—how sad. Catch-up mode in general makes you reevaluate your life, your direction, your priorities, your present social life, your destructive and addictive habits, your time-wasters, your friends who are going nowhere fast like you and even your friends who are leaving you behind. Sadly, when catch-up mode calls… some don’t answer. They take a longer toke of the joint, an extra shot of the Tequila, or snort a longer line of the coke to drown out the call—umm I mean the noise. Catch-up mode is intended to get you back on track. It’s intended to awaken you out of life’s hangover that you are perpetually in. But, like your buddy who never knows when he had enough, then of course doesn’t know when he’s had way too much—the longer you ignore the call of catch-up mode, the worse it is when life finally catches up with you. On the other hand, instead of a kick in the pants producing motivation, for some people catch up mode becomes the beginning of their depression and a tool that tears down their fragile self-image. These are the people that hate to look into life’s mirror. Instead of the mirror shattering from what looks into it, the image it reflects shatters the person looking into it. Let me tell you something—I don’t care what you see in the mirror—don’t run from it. Don’t turn your back from it or turn the lights out. If you want to turn something—use what you see to turn your life around. Use it for motivation not discouragement! It sounds so cheesy—but it does not stand any less true; today IS the first day of the rest of your life. If you have breath then you have another chance to make another idiotic decision based in laziness, procrastination, envy, fear, anger, etc. or you can start making better decisions based on reality, truth, positivity, love, forgiveness, and life! Take charge. Don’t tell me about your debt, financial situation, health, rough childhood, last relationship, speech impediment, personal phobias, etc. Put the bottle down, put the weed up, put away the dope for a minute and tell him/her its fun but you gotta chill out for a while. Use what you have and forget about what you don’t have! And there’s one thing that we all have (though not in the same amount)—time. I leave you with a classic verse, “So teach us to number our days, that we may apply our hearts unto wisdom.” (Psalm 90:12).
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