#livingmybestlife

Have you noticed that suddenly everyone around you is living their best life?

Initially I was quite cynical (even scathing) about the latest hashtag to flood the social media world.

Once I saw it, I kept seeing it. It popped up in conversation and its overuse made it sound superficial and insincere. Until it happened to me too. I was #livingmybestlife.

Yes it most definitely helped that I was holidaying, that the heat on my skin came from the Mediterranean sun and that I had replaced treading on eggshells with treading water in the Tyrrhenian Sea.

The first summer break after the long Covid winter also added to the experience.

There was something more though and so here I am many, many weeks post-vacation, tan glow faded and yet still searching for the handbook on what my best life looks like is and how to live it going forward.

I’ve often said that “when you see it, you see it”. Hardly profound, but a reminder that once you see something you can’t ‘un’ see it. I suppose it’s like that with living (& loving) too. Once you’ve felt fully alive it isn’t enough to just exist. Throw midlife into this best life mix and you understand the urgency to live at full rather than flickering flame.

Lifetime

I was living my best life when I seized every second and saw time through reverent eyes. I made the most of all the moments and not just the moments I manage to capture in between. I took up every opportunity on offer, wasting little time in my bedroom and very few flicking through my phone.  It was as if the sands of the shores I was visiting had filled up a customised hourglass calibrated to match the finite end date of my travels. With my watch on one remote time zone and my phone on other, I was left to be where I was, entirely in the moment. And as being in the moment prevents one from being anywhere else, I stopped worrying (too much) about what might be and instead chose to be.

Lifelong

I lived my best life reconnecting with friends. There is something magical about spending time with people who remember or see you for who you are, especially when you yourself may have forgotten. After years of physical separation, I felt cocooned in their “unconditionality” and tickled by their humour. When I considered how dark our humour was (it is has been heavily shaded by life experiences) and how light our laughter made me feel, I could conclude with certainty that living my best life includes a guffaw that starts in the stomach and moves through the body to escape as a chortle (some strange sounding combination of a chuckle and a snort).

Lifeline

Moving my body has always helped me live better. Unbound by my own routines and the parameters of a reformer bed or treadmill, I entered the orbit and energy of the beachfront boardwalk before the heat of the day. I have been spent most of my life close to some path that hugs the seashore but the Atlantic Seaboard and Bondi to Bronte have seldom made me feel as alive as a trip to a short strip of a tiny Middle Eastern country. Unrelated to the foreign language background noise, I could feel the difference in the sound of the place and its pace. Everyone seemed to be running, even those who looked like they couldn’t or shouldn’t be. There were knee guards and back braces and a variety of running styles and speeds but on they went. Despite what held them together and through the dripping sweat, they kept going. I starting jogging slowly, ignoring the lower back ache that had made me the almost lone walker in the first place. Soon, I was moving to a running rhythm, exhilarated and pain free. Another reminder that sometimes it only takes a little warmth and flexibility to move you towards living your best life.