What kind of days do you want to have?

In Philip Larkin's poem Days, he writes:

What are days for?
Days are where we live.   
They come, they wake us   
Time and time over.
They are to be happy in:   
Where can we live but days?

The last line of that first stanza really hits home. People (myself included) spend a lot of time living in the past, in the future, or in the catacombs of the digital world. 

The days that we have are often dictated by external responsibilities like work and family life. However, we have options. We can choose how to shape our days to come closer to the ideal day in our minds. And, we can learn to change the way we look at and perceive the unavoidable undertakings of our lives.

Either way, the most important part is actually envisioning the ideal day you would like to inhabit. 

There are so many people out in the wide world who haven't thought through what kind of day they would like to routinely have. 

So, examine your life, your habits, your days. Ask yourself: are these days fulfilling and productive? Am I experiencing days that I am happy with, or am I making concessions and living someone else's life?

Another thing: write. 

Use language as a magnifying glass to inspect your day-to-day existence through journalling. What is going well? What needs some work? How can you make the most of each day/hour/minute?

I'll leave you with this wonderful quote by Marcus Aurelius that I found on Ryan Holiday's Daily Stoic blog:


“Concentrate every minute [...] on doing what’s in front of you with precise and genuine seriousness, tenderly, willingly, with justice. And on freeing yourself from all other distractions. [...] do everything as if it were the last thing you were doing in your life".