unraveling the yarn and being happy

I have a friend who knits these beautiful creations. She will spend hours...no days...knitting sweaters and shawls and then slowly unravel the whole project if a stich is off or a knit was supposed to be a pearl and turned into a knit instead. I secretly believe that she used to wait until I came over so I could watch her unravel this perfection right before my very eyes. She would smile, even half giggle, then start slowly pulling, line by line as I cringed and helplessly looked on. I chalked it up to perfectionism with a touch of OCD (because, afterall, I can't let my college major of psychology go to waste). Then two days later, the new sweater would emerge...even more perfect than before. "For me, it is not about the final product, but that I enjoy getting there," she would say.

I have been spending a lot of time working on labels for the jams and earth friendly cleaners we are making here on the farm. Every week or so, I hand draw new labels, take off the old labels, stick them on all of the products, take pictures and post them on the website. In the last three weeks, I have done this three times (new and improved labels coming soon!). My kids think I am crazy...literally. I tell them, "for me it is not about the final product, but that I enjoy getting there." ( I generally steal words of wisdom from my friend because...well...she is wise and she always seems to know what to say...and I like making...eh...labels.). I think about this and how it relates to my friend's sweater and then again, how it relates to my life.

life should be about the journey...not the destination.

How would that single sentence change the way we see the present moment if we believed this fully? How many times have we thought: when I get this job, when I make more money, when I move, when I have a boyfriend, THEN things will be better, easier, etc... THEN I will be happy.

What if right now, things were really good. That we appreciated the moment, instead of the future, stayed in the present, instead of worried about the past and started enjoying the journey.

I am the first one to admit that life can be gut wrenching hard, but what if we started to actually love the life we are living right now...found the little things to be grateful for today and not worry about where we are headed tomorrow.

what if we all unraveled that almost-completed-sweater...not because it wasn't perfect, but because we love doing what we are doing so much, that we just can't wait until we can do it all over again...

Just because.

Now that's a life worth living.