Measuring a Real Day Against an Imaginary One

I have spent more mornings fighting the shape of the day than I have spent asking what the day was already offering me before I arrived with all my plans and resistance,
I’ve spent countless mornings meticulously planning my day, only to find myself battling against a world that refused to cooperate with my meticulously crafted plans,
I have spent more mornings treating the unexpected thing as an obstacle to the life I was trying to have instead of the actual life arriving in that particular day,
How much of what I experienced yesterday as a bad day was the day actually being bad and how much was me measuring a real day against an imaginary one,
I have spent more mornings fighting the shape of the day than receiving it and irreplaceable experience of the day I was actually inside while I was busy arguing with it...

I have treated inconvenience as something being done to me rather than something happening through me on the way to somewhere I could not have anticipated,
I’ve treated the delay, reroute, and unexpected events as proof of the universe’s indifference to my intentions, when it might have been the most attentive months,
I’ve treated interruptions as the enemy of the day, but I’ve never considered whether the interrupted day was the most important thing available to me at that moment,
What if the thing I resist is not hindering my life but is actually the direction my life has already chosen before I learned about the change,
I’ve treated inconvenience as an insult for so long that I can’t distinguish between a hard day and a day that just didn’t go as planned…

I have a list of things I feel burdened by that I could just as honestly rewrite as a list of things I get to do right now is going to be given the chance to do today,
I have a list that feels like an obligation, with demands piling up on me, I could reread it as proof of a life so full that it needs management,
I have a list, and the difference between how it feels on a heavy day and how it might feel if I let it be is unrelated to the items on the list, it’s all about the story I attach to having them,
What would change if I viewed the first task of tomorrow morning as a unique and unrepeatable experience, rather than just another thing to get through,
I have carried a list like a sentence, always open to being read as a privilege by someone ready to shed the weight of the framing long enough to truly feel its contents…

I have missed entire seasons of my life by being so committed to my planned version that I couldn’t fully experience the actual version I was living while it was happening,
I have missed the gift in the disruption by focusing on restoring the original plan instead of exploring its cause and potential benefits beneath its inconvenience,
I missed the unexpected afternoon, rerouted morning, and canceled event that turned into something else entirely because I was too busy grieving the schedule to notice the opening,
Am I genuinely present in the current version of today, or am I technically present while internally waiting for the version I planned that won’t arrive,
I’ve missed entire seasons because I insisted on my version, and I can’t get them back. But I can practice opening my hands before the day starts today…

Watchwords:
Fighting the shape instead of receiving what arrived,
Measuring a real day against an imaginary one,
The disruption arrived with something quietly underneath it,
A list that reads like sentence or like privilege,
Opening my hands before the day even begins...