December 4 – Wonder

How did you cultivate a sense of wonder in your life this year? (Author: Jeffrey Davis)

won·der: –verb (used without object)
1. to think or speculate curiously
2. to be filled with admiration, amazement, or awe; marvel
3. to doubt

Today's prompt caused me to pause and realize that I did not make a collective effort to cultivate a sense of wonder in my life every day, but based on the dictionary meaning, I did have a year full of wonder.

If you know me, you know that I think too much. I speculate all of the time and imagine all sorts of outcomes to every possible situation. I believe I do it to try and protect myself, but my imagination is very strong and I start to believe some of my outcomes to be the truth. Which in turn has caused major headaches in my life. Self-inflicted drama one might say.

I do try to look for the bright sides of life. And at times I look at the simple, small things in life and realize how awesome life really is. Have you ever heard of the website 1000 Awesome Things? My mom happened to be in Chapters one day when the author was there signing his book. She picked it up for me and I love flipping through it. I find I agree with so many of the awesome things in this book and you really do start realizing that every day life is filled with amazing. Taking a minute or two to marvel at the little things can really change one's outlook on life. Thus I started the "sparkler party" for every time I came across something awesome (for example, first bud of Spring on a tree, celebrating Hulk Hogan's birthday and spending copious amounts of time watching old WWE clips on youtube, holding a live starfish in the palm of my hand). Often, they aren't real sparklers, but I make a point of doing a little "Sparklers!" dance.

The third definition of wonder is where I excelled this year. Every decision I made I would be filled with doubt. And sometimes it would paralyze me to not making any decision at all. Which would go back to the speculating aspect of the word.

In 2011 (and beyond) I would like to have more "sparkler parties" and less doubt. I do wonder how I can go about implementing that intent.


As of January 1, 2011 I will be making this blog private. If you would like to be on the reading list, please email me at arualthebutterfly[at]gmail[dot]com