Revisiting an Old Post...

After watching the movie “Rent” last night for the millionth time I felt compelled to revisit an old blog and post part of it again.

Five hundred twenty-five thousand six hundred minutes...How do you measure a year? by daylights, by sunsets, by midnights or cups of coffee? This is one theme that keeps recurring through the entire show. There are only 525,600 minutes in a year.

To me that was never anything more than a nice way to make a song sound good. I mean did you ever really wonder how many minutes there were in a year? We all know there are 365 days, 12 months, etc... But today I heard more than that. There are many other songs that all tie to this but none that pushes it quite like this new one I found...

There's only us
There's only this
Forget Regret
Or life is yours to miss.

No Other Road
No Other Way
No Day But Today...

I had heard this a thousand times and probably sang it in the car that many times again. Never struck me as anything more than a catchy little tune that sounded nice.

This reminded me of the Latin phrase Carpe Diem which means seize the day. Make the most of every opportunity.

As I watched the movie last night I realized that the characters are all so different. Some of them spend much of their time regretting their past and letting the regret they feel keep them from moving forward. Others spend time dreaming of the future and the goals they want in life but seem to not be able to do today what is necessary to achieve them.

I find that I am most like those that dream of the future and all the things I want to do in life that I have yet to do. I always seem to stay in my comfort zone and never step outside and do the things today that will put me in a position to realize some of those dreams. At times I think that it is a fear of success that keeps me from reaching outside my box. Other times I think it is the fear of regrets…not that I might fail but that I may regret having tried it in the first place and then the dream is gone.

It is good for me to be reminded of this:

It is easy to have regrets. We have to realize that the decisions and choices we made were the best at that time. We need to forget our regret or we will miss our lives. Let's live for today and make the most of each minute of every hour, of every day, of every month, of every year. Or however you choose to measure.