The summer almost always goes really fast, too fast.  Then I look at my my daughter Claire who just started 2^nd grade, and I realize it’s not just the summer that goes fast, years FLY by once you have a kid.  It seems we as adults stop growing and watch as our kids (and/or other kids we know) grow and change almost by the day.  And then before you know it, you literally have no idea where the time went.  Everyone feels it, but no matter what, time just seems to speed up as we get older.

I was talking with my friend recently about this.  We talked about it for a while and we were reminiscing about how the things we remembered from our childhood were things that were repetitive, or recurring, such as trips to see our grandparents, or trips to the same place summer after summer.  The memories that stuck with us were not necessarily the “one time” activities.  Kids love familiarity and repetition.  They love their bedtime bath-story-routine.  If I had a penny for every time my  kids have watched the Backyardigans’ “Super Spy”  I would be a millionaire!  But as we get older, the repetition can becomes too habitual and sometimes boring.  It seems having new experiences is what keeps us from getting stuck in a rut.

I remember a while back I was walking around in my neighborhood in midtown nyc, and ran into a neighbor, Larry, who looks as though  he is  maybe in his late 60’s.  I commented that he was looking great, and he said, “Thanks, I try, you know I’m 90!”    I was blown away that this guy was so youthful and active and sharp that I asked him what his secret was.  “Do you smoke? Do you eat meat? Do you exercise? What’s your secret? I never would have guessed that you were 90!”

Sometimes I don’t want to offend people by saying something like that, like, “Holy Crap, you are so old!!!”  But the reality is that 90 years old is longer than a lot of people live with a good quality of life – even these days with modern medicine supposedly keeping people alive longer.  I was really curious about what he does, if anything. (He wasn’t offended anyway.)

His response was not what I expected.  He said, “You know what I do?  I’ll tell you.  Whenever I go somewhere, I make sure I come back a different way.  I always take a different street or avenue to come home.”  He also grew up in NYC, walked everywhere as most New Yorkers do. Navigating city streets is something that you can get creative with when you do it on a daily basis.   He also never smoked.

But this got me thinking about how many habits, and “ruts” we might have that we are not even aware or mindful of.

For kids, they grow and change so rapidly that so much of what they learn and experience is new.  They are in school, and they are always meeting new kids, playing, imagining, building, creating.  One minute they are into Elmo, next thing you know it’s Barbies or Superheroes.  Every food is a new experience.  Every smell creates a new memory. As we get older there are less and less brand new experiences, unless we create them for ourselves and get somewhat out of our familiar zone.  (I’m sure there is a ton of research done on this that I am not even mentioning.)

Think about the things you do every day that you do completely on auto-pilot. I remember hearing somewhere that if you paid attention to the way you brush your teeth or dry yourself after a shower you would notice that you do it EXACTLY the same way every single time.  You could probably do it in your sleep, many of us do!  I also heard on the radio that some people are even texting in their sleep!  Can you imagine?  Having text conversations that they have no recollection of.  (Scary!)

We all have different tendencies towards being creatures of habit.  Some of these routines make us more efficient and streamlined in terms of getting things done.  We all know someone who has had the same commute to work for 40 years or eats the same thing for breakfast since they were 10.   What about those people on Oprah who have the same haircut since the 60’s?  A little bit of forced, conscious change in our lives here and there can wake us up a little bit and keep things interesting.   And who knows?  Maybe it will keep us young!

Here are some ways you can throw a little change into your life without too much of an overhaul:

Read a new book on a topic you don’t typically read about.

Take a class in a subject you’ve always wanted to try but never had time or always thought it wasn’t practical.

Watch a movie you’ve never seen before.

Take the back roads. In other words, change your most routine trip.  Even if you can’t always take a different route, you can listen to different music or let someone else drive.

Make a new friend.

Brush your teeth with your non-dominant hand.

Travel, even if it’s just a drive or walk in a new neighborhood.

Try a new recipe or new food.

Check out a new restaurant.

Approach new opportunities and experiences with curiosity. Notice if unfamiliar people or places create anxiety or stress.  If  they do, just noticing is a new experience for you, since your “autopilot” response might be to retreat to where you are familiar.

What “new” thing can you try today?

Be well,

Danielle