Homespun by Laurel Nadon

Using our 4,000 weeks By Laurel Nadon

I had a bookmark problem a few weeks ago. I ran out. Which meant that I had started a book, gotten bored and started a new one, no less than four times. I decided to pick one and stick with it. It’s called Four Thousand Weeks; Time Management for Mortals by Oliver Burkeman. The inside cover sentence got me hooked: “The average human lifespan is absurdly, insultingly brief. Assuming you live to be 80, you have just over 4,000 weeks.”

This is not the type of book I normally read, but I noticed it at my sister-in-law’s house and the cover is rather compelling; it has four bananas, going from green, to yellow, to slightly bruised and brown, to please use me for a smoothie” brown. (My kids call these “used” bananas.)

Burkeman suggests that instead of having a fear of missing out, we should feel joy at missing out–because we’ve made a choice on how we want to spend our time. No matter what we are doing, there are things we are not doing at that same time. He suggests that we spend far too much time on things that are less important to us in order to get them off our to-do list instead of focusing each day on what we really want to be doing. No matter how much we achieve in a day, there is always more to do. Emptying our email inbox will only lead to more messages.

The last few pages have been a pretty eye-opening read. He talks about how shocking it is to go to a museum and see so many people taking pictures and videos of the art, but not really looking or experiencing it for themselves. They are capturing an image so that they can enjoy it later, instead of enjoying it right now, in the present.

The technology that we use today is such a thief of being present. I volunteered at my daughter’s sports day at the end of June, and was in charge of the human hungry hippo activity. (And yes, it was as funny as it sounds.) A few times the teams had a few minutes of lag time when they were waiting for another group to finish so they could begin. Right away, the phones came out so that they didn’t have to feel awkward or be present. I piped up, “Hey sorry guys, but this is a technology free zone.” They looked at me, puzzled. Obviously it wasn’t a technology free zone, but my point was–be present, look around you, take it in, be where you are.

Burkeman talks about the future-chasing mindset. In first grade you are getting ready for second grade, then third grade and so on. In high school, you’re getting ready for college and in college you’re getting ready to go out into the world. “They are never here. They never get there. They are never alive.” I have known people who seem to always be waiting for a future event to be happy (once I get married I’ll be happy, once I have kids I’ll be happy and so on.) It’s interesting to think of how to be more present and I think it’s in noticing the details.

I tried it out recently, while balancing gingerly and barefooted on a slack line in our trees beside the ninja line. First I made a mental list of the tasks that still needed to be accomplished (work on endless pile of laundry from last holiday; make supper; empty vegetables from dehydrator for next holiday) and then banished the list from my mind. Then I focused on the fragrance of the clovers below me, how hot the sun felt on my arms, the sound of my son’s laughter, the complex challenge at hand of stepping across the line. I felt present.

I skipped ahead to the end of the book as I usually do. I liked his suggestion to focus on one big project at a time and loved his idea to decide in advance what to fail at–I can finally accept that house cleaning is just not a department that I want to pour a lot of energy into. He suggests acting on impulses to be generous right away and to view ourselves as researchers in relationships, trying to figure out who this human being is that we’re interacting with. As life becomes routine, time seems to move faster, so he says to pay more attention to every moment, “plunging more deeply into the life you already have.”

By Lori Larsen

Did you know the word parade originated with the English in the mid-1600s and referred to a pompous show, an exhibition? In addition to being known as the largest parade, the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade is also the US’s second oldest parade.

Be sure to gather family and friends around Downtown Camrose on Thursday, July 28 for the Kick’N Country parade beginning at 10:30 a.m. Yeehaw, who don’t love a parade?

The Big Valley Jamboree music festival runs July 28 to 31 at the CRE.

Welcome BVJ, Kick’N Parade

Murray Green, Camrose Booster

Wild Rose Co-op in downtown Camrose and From Kicks to Kids decorated their store fronts to welcome people to Camrose for the Big Valley Jamboree music festival on July 28 to 31.