Closing doors...

Last Friday I went to the movies with an old friend. As always after the movie we end up talking about the movie, life, and everything in between. It's great with friends like that. We can spend hours talking about life, the future, the past, the good, the hard, and everything else that's on our mind at the moment. Tonight especially I realized something important about myself...

Things at home have just kind of been going on their own for a while now, and I sometimes feel as if I am just tagging a long for the ride. Sometimes I wake up feeling like there's a couple of weeks missing of my life. Like I somehow "lost" them or something. Have you ever felt like that? Of course they were never "lost" but rather pushed back into the back of my conscious where I don't automatically think of them and where I can pull them from memory whenever I need them. My friend and I were talking about those weeks. It is pretty interesting how things tend to get monotone, or the same, after a while. When your in your daily routines, you might not even think about what you are doing because it is the same everyday. Breakfast in the morning, coffee, changing diapers, morning nap, shower, errands, lunch, afternoon nap, work....you get the picture.

Life seems to slip you by and all of a sudden you wake up 5 years later wondering where life went. The "lost" time is always there, of course. You just are not consciously aware of it. It gets coded in your memory and you know you were there and created it, but somehow it feels lost because you actually didn't live it... I have talked about this before - living in the present. And I think it is worth mentioning again. My friend and I discussed how fast time has passed this year. Emma is almost 10 months and going on a year. So much has happened since she was born. I have changed a lot too. I am a mother now. Making different choices and having different priorities now. I have closed many doors on the past. Lost some friends and gained some new ones. Changed jobs. Moved from one house to another. From one city to another...

As we go through life we close many doors. Some are voluntary and some are not. Living in the present and staying true to your goals and dreams are natural ways of closing doors to the past. We all make choices based on the probability of gaining more happiness and freedom. We want to evolve and make things better...easier. And in order to do that, sometimes we have to let other things go. Like friends. Or hobbies. Or old selves. I had a little realization as my friend and I talked about letting things go and being ok with that. Sometimes you have to let some things go in order to make room for new things in your life. And that is ok. Being a mom means I have less time for myself. And I think that is ok. I want to spend time with Emma. As much as I can, in fact. I don't like being away from her. And that means that I don't have as much time to go to the gym, for example. And that's a choice. I sometimes miss my old carefree life where I could go to the movies whenever I wanted or go to the gym right after work. Today I have to consider Emma in all my choices, and that can feel a little daunting at first. What ever happened to me?

Well, I am still here. I am just choosing differently for myself. And as much as I appreciate the freedom to do whatever I want whenever I want, I wouldn't trade my place for anything. Because I am different now, and I am still in control of my life and my future. So, even though it feels as if I've closed the doors on many things from my past lately, and I sometimes feel sentimental about it and miss my old life, I am ok with that. Because I know that changing is a part of life, and I know from experience that when one door closes there's always another one that opens...