Play It First

Miles Davis once said, “I’ll play it first and tell you what it is latter”. Although he was speaking about his music, he was in a sense reminding us about how to live. So many of us look at our lives as set of planned events, we write our menus for the day and quietly live our lives in quiet predictability. We find either disappointment or frustration when the day doesn’t occur the way we planned it. We carry our daily planners or smart phones around with us, feeling secure knowing that we will be reminded where to go and what to do. I will admit that I too carry a Blackberry and check my email and messages feeling assured that I’m able to feel connected, just in case something needs to contact me. Perhaps my sense of importance needs reassurance like the most of us but at the same time I know the need for spontaneity calls me and when I answer, it defines explanation. I guess we can live our lives and create those lists, reminders, and hold ourselves to the promises that we will follow them or create lists and reminders with the understanding that “life happens” and usually things in our lives happen for a reason. Everyday we experience things that we had no idea would occur when we woke up. From the smallest occurrence to a major event that may change us forever. The most predicable thing in our lives is the unpredictability nature of our lives. This is the nature of being human, like children who know all too well, respond to the events around them without trying to control it, becomes their playground. So get up tomorrow morning and try not plan or anticipate your day and tell yourself,

” Today I’ll play it first and tell you what it was latter.”