Will Your Tomorrows Be Thankful For Your Todays?

This room.
When we moved into this house 26 years ago, this room was an office. We changed it into a tiny family room with a comfy couch. I have such sweet memories of all of us piling onto that couch in that tiny room full of love. Homemade popcorn and Friday night movie night. I sat on that couch every morning praying for my children and reading God’s word. Years passed. Decorations changed. Children grew up and moved out, then moved back in. The tiny room became a bedroom for our daughter, an apartment for our nephew and now, once again an office. And here I sit. I can hear the crickets chirping outside the window. It’s a reminder to me of the stillness of this moment 26 years later. All those memories that seem like yesterday. All the memories this tiny room holds. Here I sit praying for my children, their spouses and my grandchildren.

I think back on those years. All the hurry. All the rushing from activity to activity. All the worry of what I thought was so important to me at the time. Here I sit in the quiet of this room with the whispers of memories rushing past. I wish I had stopped more often and really, truly understood what was the most important. Time with my little family. Stopping to listen to little voices telling me stories of their days. Really listening and hearing them. Not allowing my mind to wander as they talked. Thinking about what I would make for dinner or where I would have to be or what I would have to do later that day or that week or that month. Just stopping in the moment and soaking it in. Because that exact moment would never come again.

Today my days seem to all be the same. What was my life? It was a vapor, but I didn’t realize it when I was younger. And now today turns into tomorrow and yet it continually feels the same. And I see those little faces in this room talking to me and giggling and I remember my mind trying to heed the advice of the older women before me. “Enjoy it because it goes by so fast”. And yet my mind was a million miles away to my list of things I thought had to be done.

What do your days hold? What is the purpose of your life? Is your life a fulfillment of the dreams you had when you were younger? Is this what you wanted your life to look like? Do you have joy in your moments? Are you happy? What is the end goal of each day? Of the minutes that turn into hours and days and years? What is the purpose of your life? What are you doing today that your tomorrows will be thankful for? Will you be thankful for your job? Your home? Cleaning and running from task to task with no time to breathe? Late night meetings, early morning alarms, emails and texts and notifications, just to start all over again? Mindlessly making dinner and doing laundry and dishes and baths and prayers and bedtime, but never truly being present? Picking up toys and collapsing into bed just to begin all over again? Why?

Why?

So often in our younger years our focus is on the future. That job that will make more money. That diet and exercise program that will make us healthier and happier. That furniture we’ve always wanted. That perfect home we’ve always dreamt of. We have no guarantee we will see tomorrow and yet our generation has become so focused on our tomorrows that we forget about all the beauty in each moment of today. If we don’t have time to focus on our Savior, if we are too busy to truly be present for our children, if we are too tired to enjoy time with our spouse every evening~
then our lives need to change.

Our priorities need to change, because nothing in this world is more important than your Savior and your family.

What will your children remember about today? One day as you sit in your family room when they are grown and gone and look back on today, is this what you want your today to look like for your children? For your family? Is this what you want them to remember? Will you remember being present. Really present?
Is that what they will remember?

And so I ask again. What are you doing today that your tomorrows will be thankful for? Because today will never come again.

I encourage you, as a mom who is now living in those tomorrows and a grandma who now realizes how important her todays are~ stop and be still and watch and listen and smile and breathe and find beauty and joy and laughter. Dance and sing, listen and hug. Tickle and giggle. Hold them and rock them.
Love them with your everything.

Love them with your everything.

You do not have to continue on the path you have made. Be fearless in your Father and change the direction your path is going.

The path of all your beautiful tomorrows starts with each beautiful moment today.