The In-Between

I’m not much of an Oprah fan, but occasionally I find some gems in her countless newsletters that make me stop and consider my life from a different angle. The quote above was no exception.

I often get caught up in the ‘big picture’ view. Everything I do is calculated to reach for that image in one way or another. The series of steps seems endless, and so it’s no wonder that I feel like I’m never really getting anywhere with my goals.

One of the best things I learned from my weight loss journey is that the smaller changes to my diet and exercise that I adopted gradually were at the core of my success. By managing my expectations and embracing each new positive change as a major victory, I found it easier to do the things that I’d resisted for so long in all of my attempts to lose weight.

In between the start of the journey and the big picture goal at the end, there’s a world of experiences that we sometimes overlook in our rush to reach the finish line. We forget to live in the moment and enjoy it just for the sake of being exactly where we are in our journeys and reveling in that fact.

Somehow the present gets traded in for the future, and we find ourselves incapable of truly living in gratitude for the life we have right now.

Goals are important and vital to self-improvement, but not at the expense of sacrificing the joys of the in-between. Be mindful of all those little steps. That’s where life is.