Time ticks away...get out and live

"Time, Time,
Time, see what's become of me,
While I look around for my possibilities."

These lyrics are from a classic song by Paul Simon, called "A Hazy Shade of Winter," a song that, like most of Paul Simon's work, I love very much.

I've been thinking a lot about time as of late. I know I have yet it on this blog, but my wife and I are going to be parents soon. Very soon. Such as, a few weeks soon. Time has flown by and I can not believe that nine months has gone by as swiftly as it did.

When we first found out we were expecting, I spent several months in a constant "list" mode, thinking only of everything that had to be done and crossed off that list. By about month 7 or 8, all of a sudden it hit me like a brick - this is the ONLY time, ever, that this will be your first child. This is the ONLY time, ever, that you will have where life is like this before you are, a family, with a child.

Suddenly, I took a step back. I wish it hadn't taken me 8 months to do so, but I'm glad it hit me when it did.

Ferris Bueller was right. "Life moves pretty fast. If you don't stop and look around once in a while, you could miss it."

Today is the only time we get today. I implore you, folks, don't let it pass you by. Embrace it. Love it. Live it.

It is one of the greatest feelings in the world when you do.

"Oh, Magoo, you've done it again!" OR the true gifts in our lives

With the holidays comes all the classic Christmas specials that I loved all my life, just as many before me have. You know the classics I'm talking about - the Rankin Bass Stop-Motion Rudolph, Frosty, Charlie Brown.

Well, while skimming across channels this past week, my wife and I came across an obscure animated holiday classic on the Canadian channel. (You've got to love those Canadians, they air the best stuff this time of year...and don't overload you with these 'new' holiday specials that are all CGI and no heart.) But I digress...

That obscure Christmas special I speak of was "Mr. Magoo's Christmas Carol" from 1962. That's right - Mr. Magoo had his own version of a Christmas Carol, with him playing Ebenezer Scrooge, no less.

Now, why am I mentioning all of this back story? Because during one of the songs (yes, there were song numbers), Magoo as Scrooge sings the following line once he's learned about the wonder of generosity:

"Ringle, ringle, coins when they jingle, make such a lovely sound. Give them away and nobody can rob you. "

Well, I've had this one lyric playing around in my head ever since and it really got me thinking. Scrooge learned a very valuable lesson that day - that the items that some of us value so very much, to the point of obsession - money, the latest electronics, etc - are absolutely nothing once we leave this realm, aside from becoming the target of some underhanded grave robber.

That thought doesn't even need to apply to after our deaths. Think of, unfortunately, how many terrible robberies and burglaries we hear about in the news on a daily basis. So many of the times, what do we hear is taken? Money, electronics, fashionable, expensive items.

Remember a ways back we talked about giving things away? Well that song lyric sort of triggered that memory and line of thought for me.

I think Magoo and Scrooge were really on to something.

Hold onto and cherish the things that are truly important in this life - your family, your spouse or significant other, your children, your pets, your friends - all the things that bring love into your life. Therein lies your true value.

As Harry Bailey said in "It's a Wonderful Life" - "to my brother, George. The richest man in town!" Not because of any wealth he had accumulated. After all, he was practically broke, with three kids living in a run down old, drafty house. But because of the lives he enriched simply by being a giving person.

It's not about objects we can have. That just becomes fodder and targets for the jealous and unsavory who want to take it.

Cherish and appreciate those LIVES that you've touched and touched yours. That feeling of love is something nothing and no one can take from you, in this life, or after.

I can't think of a better gift this holiday season than that.

Love to you all.

Our thoughts, our world

"All that we are arises from our thoughts. With our thoughts, we make our world."

I came across this quote on a little app on my fiance's IPod that presents you with a handful of Buddha Quotes each day. In fact, I believe it's called Handheld Buddha. This particular quote stuck out in my mind and has been swimming around in my brain ever since.

What we think shapes the world around us - how we act, how we speak, how we perceive. We've heard many a time that a negative mindset brings about a negative reaction from the universe right back to us. In turn, a positive mindset will return a positive reaction from the universe.

Let's take it one step further.

A few years ago, I was sitting in a coffee shop on a rainy Fall day and had one of the most memorable conversations with my friend and noted author, Larry Trivieri Jr., where we talked about the concept of manifestation.

I was reading a book called "An Unlikely Prophet" at the time, by an author we were both big fans of - Alvin Schwartz. The concepts in this book led Larry and I to discuss some bizarre instances in our own lives. On my end of things, we were discussing concepts, situations, and realities that I had written about in stories, scripts, and films, that later, whether you believe it or not, started becoming true.

At the time that they were written, they were merely visualizations of ideas, ideals, and desirable outcomes that I was writing out of my own subconscious mind and onto the page (and in some cases from mind to page to film). However, as years went by, I could look back and realize that life situations that had materialized had evolved and developed very much in the way I had created.

One of our mutually favorite writers, Grant Morrison, has talked about this for years. Morrison wrote a comic series called "The Invisibles," where he based one of the series' key characters - King Mob - after himself. Morrison notes that many of the trials and tribulations that he put the character of King Mob through throughout the series - whether it was meeting a particular type of woman, or having his lungs crushed - it, over time, began to happen to Morrison as well.

In these cases, whether my own, Morrison's, or Larry's, thoughts literally had created a world - a reality.

We do it every day, whether we realize it or not. You, yes, YOU, are creating the world around you, your life of tomorrow with your thoughts of today. You an disbelieve it, you can shun it, or you can embrace it, and start creating your world today!