Have you ever thought about how amazing it is to be born? It’s an incredible process. And to be here now, decades later, is something of which I am in awe.
A few months ago I asked a friend how he was going to celebrate his birthday. He growled at me saying he doesn’t like birthdays, he’s too old, and he’d just as soon forget them altogether.
Personally, I love my birthday. To me it’s a celebration of life, a commemoration, an anniversary of a life lived. To be given this experience of living not only for a few moments, hours, days or years but decades. And not only given this opportunity to live for this long, but to be given the choice how to live, to choose the way I think, to make the choices I do, to live this experience of life.
The Creative Process alone is astounding but then to be given this opportunity on a silver platter to experience this Livingness that we are takes my breath away. And then to witness how this very Livingness expands outside of me and expresses Itself in countless and unique ways through other people, through animals, through Nature, through all life. This experience of living brings me to my knees in deep gratitude for this sacred opportunity to live.
I had never met anyone who I shared the same birth date with until last year when I discovered I shared the same birthday with one of our members here, the lovely Kamal. This expanded into meeting several people with the same birth date. Another member told me he is living to 100! This annual birthday celebration of this human experience is one well worth keeping.
Yes, I celebrate my birthday gladly, enthusiastically, and with great joy. And my grumpy friend who didn’t like his birthday, celebrated it this year.
By Jill Inglis