You Don’t HAVE to, You GET to!

Everything you do is worth enjoying.  “Dost thou love life?  Then do not squander time, for that’s the stuff life is made of.” – Benjamin Franklin

Most of us see the truth in Benjamin Franklin’s famous quote, but few of us live it.  I don’t think we purposely squander time.  It just happens.  Many of us work so hard and so frantically that we’re too tired to do much more than collapse in front of the TV each night after a long day of our pursuits.  We sleepwalk through our days, forgetting to savor the richness and color of life.  Tragically, days, weeks, months and years slip through our fingers like sand, unnoticed and unappreciated.  In short, squandered.

During my life, I have worked with everyone from a Tony Award winning director and performed for Presidents and Astronauts to spending my time coaching brand new, hope filled actors just starting out.  Some of the best “newbie” actors are children, wide eyed and awestruck by the mere mention of taking a new class or seeing a live performance on Broadway.  I have noticed that children have the edge on living in the moment.  They don’t live one second in the future or one second in the past.  They experience full, passionate hours of playing, learning and truly experiencing this wonderful world.  I’ve often asked myself:  why does this sense of wonder have to drop away as we grow older?

The answer is that it doesn’t.  When you make the decision to live each hour to the fullest, life becomes a buffet of great splendor.  No matter what dates are eventually carved onto your tombstone, each hour you live can be a magnificent symphony where life is measured by moments and experiences, not clocks and calendars.

Take this message to heart and I guarantee you will reawaken to, or perhaps even discover for the first time, a life, acting career and legacy filled with purpose, passion, pleasure and peace.

I couldn’t have said it better myself – and I didn’t.  The above passage was revised, laced with my perspective and shared with you from the amazing Giovanni Livera, author of Live a Thousand Years.

I’m only half-way through this book and I’m recommending it HIGHLY!  Lisa