Recently, I heard an interview on NPR with Elisabeth Kubler Ross, the doctor who began the modern hospice movement with her explorations into the experiences of dying patients.  I missed the very beginning of the interview, so I’m not sure about her current health status, but she talked about her own process of being ill now and, it seemed, of preparing to die.   As I listened, one comment of hers struck me – and it was the comment used at the end of the interview.  She talked about how she believes in life after death, in reincarnation, and in how she will soon be dancing in the cosmos.  But, she said immediately afterward, “I only wish I had danced more in this life.” 

Her comment reminded me of a show I saw on public television a number of years ago.  It was a documentary about a man dying of cancer.  (I may have mentioned this show in prior experiments, as it has stayed with me all these years.)  One scene, in particular, drove home what Kubler Ross said.  The patient was standing in his apartment, looking out the window, on the day he prepared to go to the nursing home.  As he looked at the view, he said that his only wish is that he had spent less time cleaning his apartment and more time enjoying life.

These two interviews got me to thinking about how easy it is to get caught up in the everyday chores of life, to focus on the stresses and demands that are part of most everyone’s daily experience.  And so, it seems to me that these interviews offer us a powerful invitation to become aware of the moments when we are invited to dance – when life reaches out to us with impressions of beauty, explosions of unexpected laughter, and other kinds of delight – or when we have an opportunity to create these for ourselves.  And, even more importantly, these two people who are able to speak from the perspective of the end of life offer us the reminder to engage the times when life asks us to dance, rather than turning away, caught up in the busy-ness of everyday life.

For this week’s experiment, I invite you to review how you spend your time, and to notice how much time you allow yourself to “dance”, whatever that may mean for you.  If it’s okay to do, review the day as if you were looking back from the end of life.  Would you be pleased with how you chose to spend your time?  Would there be things you wish you had done?  I don’t mean this to be a morbid exercise.  Rather, it’s an invitation to become conscious of choices and how you spend your time.  For most of us, even in the midst of incredibly busy lives, there are moments of choice – small moments of down time – where we can choose either to “dance” or do more work.

As with all the experiments, play with this one.  It’s an invitation to become more aware, and to have an opportunity to shift if you find that the choices you make aren’t as nourishing as they might be.  Having time to reflect on the quality of our choices is a real gift, as it’s always possible to change the direction we’re headed, even in the immediate moment.  I think of the weekend moments I’ve been caught up in the million and one things to do, the deadlines to meet, and then have chosen to go to Central Park to listen to the trees for a while, or to a movie for a change of pace.  By the time I get home, I’m energized and ready to roll on projects that have to be done.