30 Days of Writing

In thirty-one days I will turn thirty years old. Some people spend the year before they turn thirty filling their days with exciting new adventures – wildly checking items off the greatest bucket list of all time.  Others take a picture a day to commemorate the last year of their twenties.  Just under a year ago, as I metaphorically blew out the candles on my cake, I contemplated spending my year of twenty-nine doing things at once momentous and stupendous – but, in the end, I “just “ lived. 

In so many ways, twenty-nine is a bizarre year of life.  It’s like being twenty in that, from the moment you celebrate your birthday, people start asking you about the next one.  You never get to be twenty-nine – you only get to be “almost thirty” – although, unlike being twenty, there is no party filled with debauchery, mayhem, and the sweet thrill of a first legal drink waiting on the other end.   Instead, there is the birthday that society marks as some sort of arbitrary dividing line between the blessed insouciance of the twenty-something and the settled stability of the thirty-something.  In one month, I will no longer be in my twenties.

I failed to mark each day of the past year with something legendary or often with anything interesting at all.  I do not, however, want the last thirty days of my twenties to slip by unnoticed - lost in the cold, grey, blustery haze that is February and early March.  Most years, I find that around this time I put my head down and grin and bear it until I wake up to find myself branded with a new “age.”  Not this year.  This year, I will do something different.

When I first conceived of this project I thought perhaps I would do something new every day for thirty days and write about it.  Then I considered some sort of physical challenge – I’ll take thirty yoga classes in thirty days and write about it.  Both of those options seemed like too much.  This wasn’t supposed to be an albatross around my neck, but a celebration and commemoration of a milestone birthday.  Not surprisingly, I found clarity of purpose in my developing yoga practice. 

Often when I’m holding a pose in class – thighs burning, triceps on fire, sweat running swiftly into my eyes and pooling on my upper lip – the instructor will say something to the effect of “Take a deep breath.  Find something new in this pose.”  When I first began practicing yoga, this phrase meant nothing to me.  Find something new? It was all new! It was phrase that stuck in my head, though, and I’ve been thinking about how it applies to my life – to all our lives.  So often we live day to day, failing repeatedly to “find something new” in our lives – in our bodies and minds, our relationships, our jobs, our faith, or the world around us.  We don’t find it because we aren’t looking for it, but that doesn’t mean it isn’t there. 

For the next thirty days, I will write every day.  For me – that alone will be new.  Each day, I will “find something new.”  Some days, I'll actually do something new (suggestions are welcome!)  Other days I know I will struggle to simply see a challenge or a single moment in a different light.  It won’t be a perfect endeavor, but it will be a mindful and honest one, and in it I hope to celebrate both the person I have become and the one I have yet to be.  So here’s to thirty, friends!  Thanks for being along for the ride.