2020 is a leap year (Duh, I am sure you already knew that). Today being the extra day that we only get every four years. What is funny is that I do not remember the last leap year. extra day...So insignificant that it didn’t even register on my timeline.
However this year, I am struck by how much I see the world differently. Each day something to be cherished and lived. How much my life used to feel like every day, another day to slog through and endure.
So I have decided to look at leap years as gifts. Every four years the universe (yes I know I am stretching this concept here) gives us an extra day that we somehow live without for four years. It got me thinking that perhaps this day should become more than just an anomaly and a total screw job for those people born on this day. I can remember being a kid and thinking how wrong it was that people with birthdays on February 29th really, really got screwed...I really believed that they only got presents every four years.
I have decided that I am going to make the leap year extra day a day in which I (attempt) to leap into myself, my community and my fellows. I am going to dedicate this day every four years to be something other than a regular day. Kind of my own holiday. I am going to call it Leap Day - Learning, Evolving, And Progressing Day. I mean we have days that are claimed for every other day - just google it sometimes. I am pretty sure there is a bring donuts to work day - ok so I couldn’t find that one but I did find out that February 7th is work naked day...so there’s that. I am NOT going to celebrate that one so you can all relax. Although I could be writing naked every day...you just don’t know do you?
I am going to sandwich in Learning, Evolving And Progressing Day (herein after referred to as LEAP Day) in between Sleeping in Public Day (February 28) and World Compliment Day (March 1). I can’t believe that the nut jobs that came up with all these other wacky holidays left February 29th alone.
So what the hell is LEAP Day? It can be whatever you want it to be. I am not going to proscribe any holiday parameters here...except one. I will ask you to at least consider what you can do today to learn, evolve and progress in your life? It can be tiny or monumental. Just one thing today and then a commitment to every four years turn your focus toward yourself with the idea that you learn something new about yourself. You allow that knowledge to take you deeper and evolve you into a better version of yourself. And then use that knowledge of self to better something other than yourself. Just one day, every four years.
I am going to get offline now and go get started on my LEAP Day. I will report back to the class what I find out. For now, I think that I am pretty content with making this extra day meaningful. Attempting to use it wisely. Not just allow it to pass without thought or intention. I suppose an argument could be made that we could/should make every day a LEAP Day but that kind of feels like a lot to ask of some people. I have learned the hard way that not every one wants to grow and deepen their self knowledge. Which is their right and their purview. However, I would also say that the world really needs all of us to work on being better versions of ourselves. Really. I mean seriously - we literally change the planet by changing ourselves. It is really that fucking simple. Great change comes in the momentary adjustments we make to ourselves, our reactions and our beliefs. Tiny, almost microscopic changes can have huge impact within our lives, our families, our communities, and finally the world at large. We are all interconnected. What I do or don’t do affects you in large and small ways. This is an immutable fact of existence.
So I am off to explore and enjoy my LEAP Day. I hope you will too. And hey, please let me know what you do and what you learn...even if it is as simple as you learned that you hate my made up holiday. I can handle it. I mean, I think it isn’t really asking a lot to do this every four years. The dentist makes us come to them twice a year and that seems like a big ask...LEAP Day is only requesting something from you every four years and I promise that I will never ever ask to put my fingers in your mouth!
How would your life change if you really spent just a tiny bit of time every four years learning, evolving and progressing? Here we go!
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