Make Surprising Yourself Part of Living
When was the last time you were surprised? Or when you chose to surprise someone?
This weekend, I spent time with my nephew (in-law). At one point, he created a fun game with his chunky crayons – he made a ‘forest’ of them by standing them on end.
The look of surprise on his face at what he had made was priceless. A bright colourful collection of standing pointy ‘sticks’. The pride that came with it was obvious and endearing. He’s two, and learning to be in the world. He’s not yet aware of rules, but he’s well aware of the achievement and joy that doing something new can bring. In doing something different, he surprised himself, and pleased himself.
I think we older ones sometimes forget that experience. The joy and pride that comes when we surprise ourselves with our creativity, tenacity, performance or just our out of the box-ness.
It happens when we are learning something new, using something that we have for something other than it’s intended or normal use, or simply playing around with concepts that suddenly bring a new level of understanding. Actively stretching our minds or doing ‘not thinking’ and suddenly making something else happen that was unintended.
It’s a wonderful thing to put yourself into ‘surprise’ mode. How might you do that this week? Where can you be spontaneous and say no to what you say yes to, free up space or indeed say yes to what you might usually say no to.
It might be a good way to open your eyes, ears, body and mind up to things that allow you to feel surprised. Have a think about it.
P.S. I’m about to have a birthday. It’s not a ‘big’ one, but it is my next one – and I love them. As an excuse to gather people, as a way of connecting to those I’ve not heard from in a while, or reached out to. It’s a great ‘excuse’ to be in touch.
I usually hold a picnic in Kew Gardens. I invite everyone (I mean everyone I know). I never know who will show up. That’s part of the fun. It requires that I entirely let go of the outcome and just focus on ensuring that I know I’ve set up the details well enough for everyone to know them. I let attendance be a complete surprise. It’s part of the fun. This year, it’s happening on the 16th June. I created a FB event with all the details – you’ll find the link below if you want to surprise me!