Rumination

It is interesting for me to think about the arc of my thoughts over the last 20 years.

As a kid, I thought a lot about my future. I was incredibly introspective for a 13-year-old. I had all kinds of aspirations – I wanted to play college basketball, run my own business someday. Though what I wanted changed over time, that line of forward thinking continued through college. I spent more time anticipating what my career would be like, who I would marry, and so on.

Shortly after college, though, my thoughts began to focus on ghost in the rearview mirror. I thought about college majors I should have considered, friends I’d made and lost and would never see again. I thought about how I didn’t play college basketball and how I wasn’t yet running my own business. My thoughts were stuck in the past.

Then I had kids. Now my thoughts are on the future. What kind of dad will I be to them? How should I raise them, what should I teach them? Heck, what about my life? What do I want to do, see, and accomplish in the next 10 years? My thoughts today all seem to be forward facing once again, just like when I was a kid.

My concern is that when my kids are grown and out of the house, I’ll look back and wonder where the time went. I’ll think about the things I did or didn’t do in the preceding 20 years. I’ll be right back to where I was, thinking about the past again.

Rumination is one hell of a disease. The only cure is to live today, in the present, in this moment. Because life is nothing more than a series of moments. And each one we aren’t present for is one we will never see again.