Every Monday I rub the sleep from my eyes, get ready for the day and hop on a shuttle to campus. For those of you who know me, you probably know all too well that I often skip around wearing a goofy smile. Naturally, I wear this same goofy smile on my shuttle ride over to class, but every Monday I come to find that nobody else in the crowd smiles back at me. Why? Simple. Nobody sees me because everyone is lost in another world instead of the one we physically exist in.
Now, believe me, I understand the struggle of trying to fit something both witty and relatable in 140 characters and the agony of deciding how high to set the exposure on your next Instagram photo.
I understand that you want to update your best friends on that hilarious thing that happened in your lecture hall and catch up on your Snapchat stories so that awful notification will go away.
I understand that maybe you’re reading breaking news or checking your grades or shopping for a new outfit for that party next weekend.
I also understand that life is happening all around us all the time, but you’re missing it because you’re looking down instead of looking up.
Go outside and breathe. Lose yourself in this reality instead of the life trapped inside of your phone. Surfing the web, engaging in social media and texting friends are great past times, but that’s all they’re meant to be. That thing that’s glued to your hands is just a box; it’s everything happening outside of that box that truly matters. It’s the sun shining perfectly through a canopy of trees and the dog hanging his head out the window on the freeway. It’s the first-date you witness from afar and the musician you see playing on the side of the street for the first time. It’s little moments like these that make each of my days unique and memorable, but it’s awfully difficult to catch them with my head down.
Put your phone away and look around. Embrace the weather and the people and the things going on in this real world. The number of likes you got on your last photo or the quality of comments you received online doesn’t define you. Your life is more than that. Your life can be a riveting story of special little moments strung together if you pay close enough attention to them.
So I dare you- give yourself the chance to have those moments and look up.
