Firsts

Life is full of "firsts".

The good ones: The first job, first day at school, first love, first born child, first home, first car, first big trip you take....

And in the bad: first job to be laid off from, first loss of a loved one, first car accident, first miscarriage, first argument in your marriage, first close friend or family member who loses their life too soon, first major financial setback....

Good, bad, planned and unexpected. It seems the things that shape us most in life, are 'firsts'.

I have observed in my life and those around me, that when we get caught up in the routine of life, staying plugged into the matrix, we lose site of the freshness that comes with new experiences.

Habits are in and of themselves, good and very useful. But in the busyness that becomes life for all of us in the 21st century, it can be a drug. One that numbs us from feeling life as it was meant to be felt. As my friend John Eldredge says in Wild at Heart, there is SO MUCH MORE. More to see, more to experience. This life is ALWAYS FRONTIER. If you look up the definition of frontier it clicks:

a new field for exploration... Yes, that's where I want to be.

And then I think about routines: per Webster's, a habitual or mechanical performance of an established procedure.

Mechanical? Procedure? Something about this just seems sterile and too ordinary for me.

So I sit here today pondering all of this in light of our firstborn child, Tyler who was born less than a week ago. This has awakened me not only to how this relates to his young life and where his journey will go; but also to the bigger picture of the life I am living. Of the life you are living this very moment as you read this. How do we describe it??

Routine vs. Frontier

As for me, I choose frontier.

So today the frontier for me looks like this: firstborn child, first time to see my parents and my wife's parents become grandparents and hold this little guy. The first time to drive home from the hospital with Tyler and knowing that as we sit in the driveway, the moment we step out of the car, everything changes! The moment Kelli & I look at each other as new parents. First sleepless night changing diapers. Going back to work as a 'dad'. Taking our inaugural trip together with our new family.

Of course, you do not have to be having a child to truly experience such. But I have observed, that we rarely have the clarity to step back IN the moment when these instances occur to REALLY, REALLY appreciate them and let them move and mold us to the core.

Well, I am off to see what this stage of the frontier holds in store for me now and what firsts I will encounter next... At the very least, I know it will be an exploration and not a mechanical process.

May you find clarity & purpose that moves you in your own "firsts".

-cw