“Life is not a parking space.” -Sondra, Mom’s Night Out movie
No, folks. Life is NOT a parking space. It’s not designed to find a spot and snuggle right in and park there for long stretches of time.
We all have responsibilities. You may have a “9-5 job” or you may have a demanding career. You may be a parent, a spouse, a care taker, a carpool mom. You may cook, clean, mow the yard, pay the bills and take care of the dog. You may teach, preach or counsel. You may doctor, nurse or rehab. Whatever you “do”, we have all responsibilities.
Now outside of these responsibilities is a whole other life waiting to be explored. Sometimes we get complacent and we get out of bed with the same ole routines. We start the day in our “parking space” and we don’t move until it’s time to get ready for bed. Then we get up and start the next day over heading to the same parking space.
And we sit – metaphorically speaking. We gravitate to the same parking spot. We go to the same restaurants; shop at the same grocery store and fix the same dinners. There is so much more to explore in this big parking lot of a world. Yes we have to stop and rest and park it a while, but don’t stay there.
Like Sondra said, “life is not a parking space”. You’re not meant to be parked and never moved. Explore the world a bit. Start small and fix a new recipe. Watch basketball from a different spot on the couch. Go to a different vacation spot for spring break. Paint your nails a bright pink and have ice cream with that cake.
Explore the world. Don’t get stuck in the parking space! If you have to, back in so you can make the quick get away when you get up the courage to put it in drive.
Enjoy the day and do just ONE THING to move out of the parking space and into the 4-lane highway of life! If you can’t do something for yourself, then do something for someone else. Once you experience the thrill of doing something outside out of the parking space, you can’t help but move at full speed!
