Leading on the Forward Edge – At Home · Character Creates Opportunity® · Reflection: “The Last Ordinary Day”
Key takeaways
- Name a good moment out loud while you are in it, with one simple sentence.
- Give ordinary moments five extra minutes, because the real conversation usually shows up around minute five.
- Do the ordinary thing badly rather than skip it; the burnt dinner and distracted drive still count.
Let's face it, most of us are quietly waiting for the important days.
The graduation. The wedding. The championship game. The holiday when everyone finally makes it home at the same time. We circle those on the calendar and tell ourselves that is when life will really be happening.
Which means we treat everything in between as rehearsal.
The Tuesday drive to practice with the radio turned down low. The dinner that came out burnt and got eaten anyway. The argument about homework that neither of us handled well. The grocery run, the folded laundry, the twenty quiet minutes on the couch before somebody's phone went off.
Ordinary days. Warm-up laps before the real race.
I have lived enough of them by now to know better, and I still catch myself doing it.
Here is what shows up later, usually when we are not ready for it. There is a last ordinary day in every season of a family's life. A last day of carrying a child on our shoulders. A last day of a house with everybody under one roof. A last ordinary conversation with a parent while they are still fully themselves.
None of those days announce themselves. Nobody hands us a program or blows a whistle. We do the drive, eat the dinner, lose the argument, go to bed — and then one day we look up and that season is over.
The days we would pay almost anything to have back are rarely the big occasions. They are the Tuesdays.
It works the same way outside our homes. The workplace has its last ordinary day too, the last afternoon a particular team is together before the reorganization we did not see coming. So does our community, the last season we coached, the last year we sat in the same row beside the same people.
We only ever recognize those days looking backward.
We cannot force ourselves to feel the weight of an ordinary day while we are inside it. But we can change how we handle one. Here are a few steps that have helped me over the years:
- Name it out loud while we are standing in it. This feels awkward the first time and it is worth doing anyway. In the car on the way home, or at the table when the plates are still out, say some version of "this is a good one." Not a speech, not a post on social media, just a simple sentence. Naming a moment while we are standing in it is how we stop filing it under rehearsal, and it teaches everyone at the table to notice their own life while they are living it.
- Give the ordinary moment five extra minutes. The pull is always toward the next thing on the list, and the next thing will still be there. Stay at the table five minutes after the plates are cleared. Sit on the edge of the bed five minutes longer than the goodnight required. Almost nothing important in my life has ever been said in the first minute of a conversation. The real thing shows up somewhere around minute five, and only if we are still sitting there.
- Do the ordinary thing badly rather than skip it. We tell ourselves we will show up when we can do it right…when work settles down, when we are less tired, when we can be the version of ourselves we had in mind. That day does not arrive. The burnt dinner still counted. The distracted drive to practice still counted. Pick the one ordinary thing this week we have been quietly outsourcing or postponing, and do it ourselves at whatever grade we can manage on a Tuesday.
I am not writing this from higher ground. I have missed plenty of ordinary days while I was busy preparing for important ones, and I have learned that the bill for that comes due quietly, years later.
None of this requires a change in our circumstances. It only requires deciding that today is not a warm-up.
As we treat our ordinary days as the real thing, we will build and strengthen our character, and Character Creates Opportunity to be fully present with those we care about most, while we still have the day in front of us.
If I were to ask you, "What is holding you back today from being your best for those you care about most?" what would you say?
Please reach out if I can help you today. My mobile is 269-370-9275 and my email is david@harvesttimepartners.com
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This reflection builds on two earlier Character Creates Opportunity® posts: Before It Is Too Late and When We Were Young.
Questions this reflection answers
How can I be more present with my family on ordinary days?
Treat ordinary days as the real thing, not rehearsal. Name a good moment out loud while you are in it, stay five extra minutes at the table or bedside, and do the everyday things yourself even when you cannot do them perfectly. None of this needs a change in circumstances, only a decision that today is not a warm-up.
Why do ordinary family moments matter so much?
Every season of family life has a last ordinary day, like the last time you carry a child on your shoulders, and none of them announce themselves. We only recognize them looking backward. The days people most want back are rarely graduations or weddings. They are the regular Tuesdays spent together.