The Bubble of Your Reality Needs Popped!

I often think of ways to explain the world to individuals who are trapped inside their own personal bubble of reality, never looking outside those enclosed, restrictive walls they've been placed inside by various means; materialism, egoism, media, television, technology, distractions, negative thoughts, emotions, etc.

It's a daunting task, and I hope that you'll join me as I travel down this path with only one goal - to help others to reach out, ever so slightly, and press on the imagined walls surrounding them. Their personal blinders, if you will, are what I speak of. To help them put more and more pressure on the wall of their personal bubble, and eventually a crescendo explosion as the bubble pops, opening them up to the realities they've been unaware of for so many years of their mortal experience in this world.

I'm sure that many people out there do have good intentions - they make plans to spend more time with their family, children, loved ones; but always something gets in the way. Always there's some "thing" that shows up just in time to mess up those plans and make them push them back just a bit. Then a bit more, and a bit more, until eventually those plans are considered a pipe dream - unattainable, lost but not forgotten; simply regrets anymore that they wish they could have done but never did for whatever reason.

There's no time like right now to do those things, because most of us cannot possibly know what the future holds. Those that do seek to forget, and distance themselves from the realities of knowing.

I have a challenge for you. Yes, YOU!

It's a very simple challenge that starts slowly, and is certain to cascade into a welcome change in lifestyle over a broad range of time. Eventually it will become a daily routine, and you'll never imagine that this wasn't the way everything worked before...

Set aside a day, any day of the week - even a weekend when there's less going on in the hustle and bustle of this rat race we all are forced to partake in. Just a single day, and do the following:

• Turn off the TV. Do not allow the television to be turned on all day long from the moment your eyes open to the time they close for the night's rest.
• Take the now free time that is normally spent disintegrating into a lump on the couch to share precious moments with your family, loved ones, or children - or all of the above.

Now, what do you do? This is a fantastically difficult question to answer - normally, "quality time" spent with family was once known to be watching a favorite TV show together before bed. Perhaps you would gather together to watch your favorite sports team's game each week. Perhaps you would sit with your spouse, read the newspaper of an afternoon while the nightly news played in the background, barely noticing eachother's presence in the room after a while.

Here are a few very simple, and most of the time FREE, things you can do with this time you used to call TV time:

1. Go to the Library - information should never have a price tag, and at the Public Library, it doesn't. You can literally spend hours with your child(ren) in the Library before you realize a single minute had passed.
2. Go to the Park - this also has no price tag, and is endless entertainment for a family with kids, a young couple, or elderly lovebirds married for decades on end.
3. Go to the YMCA - nowadays the "Y" has a membership fee, unfortunately. They've strayed from their community based mission and have become a standard corporation, but activities spent with loved ones will not only bond you, but make your body healthier as well.
4. Go for a jog/walk - this is something most don't even consider to be "enjoyment", but it can be if spent with people you care about, and who care about you. A simple stroll with my daughter in the evening gives us time alone to talk about anything her 6 year old mind can come up with, and I can try and sink in some wisdom that just might be remembered.
5. Go for a bike ride - sometimes you don't even notice the most beautiful things around you until you stop passing them by at 45 MPH, and roll past them at a slower pace when your mind can process what's around you fully, and appreciate nature and the organic beauty and symmetry of the world you inhabit.

I hope that you do take this challenge. Remember, it's only one day - one single day of your life this week that you can set aside to slow down, leave the cell phones at home, and go out and simply enjoy yourself. It can be relieving, it can rid you of your everyday stresses and cares, and it can literally re-forge old bonds that may be failing after a while of living in this materialistic, ego-maniacal world dominated by "things" that don't really matter.

Much love and get out there to live for once!