I'm looking out the fourth-floor window of a New York City hotel. I am alone. Often when solo, I think about how the world is out there moving and spinning beyond me.
💼☕️A guy with his paper cup coffee and briefcase walks up the sidewalk briskly ... meetings to get to ... people to hire and fire ... big suit decisions to make.
🍼👶🏽A woman pushes a baby stroller. Maybe she can't take the quietness in her city apartment with only herself and a baby who is unable to speak. Or maybe she has errands to run, people to catch up with, or is dropping off the baby to a sitter so she can head to work.
🚧⛏Construction workers guide a large beam into place on a rooftop next door.
💂🏼🏨Across the street, a clean-cut bellman in cap and uniform stands guard outside of a posh hotel under a canopy protecting a red-carpeted sidewalk.
👫
An older couple strolls by arm in arm.
🚖
Yellow taxis cruise past, the latest Broadway show in lights on top of the vehicle, like a hat.
Watching out the window makes me feel cut off. Left out. I am a natural participator - people feed me, sustain me, enliven me. Extroverted through and through - I refuel and gain my energy by being around people.
I know that around this gigantic pulsing city, inside the myriad of office buildings, television studios, retail stores, health clubs, bars, restaurants, churches, and theaters, people are getting through Hump Day bustling, working, phoning, drinking, lifting, keyboard clacking, praying, sipping coffee, conferencing, auditioning, clerking, eating, and practicing.
I am a tourist in town to see Cher perform. I can choose to join the moving and spinning beyond the window ... or choose to stay in my "I-❤️-NY" pajama bottoms and watch from the window on this snappy-cold sunless day. Wish. Hope. Wonder. Yearn.
I could get dressed, fix my face, and take a walk ... spin and move with the city ... step in to see where the day takes me and which people cross into my space in conversation or smiles. Move. Do. Join. Activate.
Life allows us the choice to participate or the choice to sit back. It's like being at a wedding ... are we the ones on the dance floor jiving to every song? Or are we motionless at the table sipping through a straw and watching everyone else have fun?
Some days we feel in the mood for the first; other days we're in for the latter. Some people actually sit back all the time. I am not good with that - at all. I like to be in the thick of things. First person at the event. Last one to leave. Drives Hubs-the-Introvert nuts.
Whichever is fine - it's our choice. There is not a right way and a wrong way. It is our way, our comfort level.
Yet ... if we choose to sit back and observe, we are not allowed to whine: 😞
- "Oh, I wish that was me!"
- "Hey, I want that, too!"
- "Awww, I feel so alone."
- "Wow, they are so lucky to get to do that."
- "That seems fun!"
And if we choose to participate, we are not allowed to complain: 👎🏽
- "Oh, I am SO, SO busy!" (hey, we created it)
- "Life is way too hard."
- "Man, I cannot manage all of this."
- "People totally grate on my nerves"
- "I have zero downtime."
Yes, l
ife allows us to join in or sit back. Whichever one we choose, it doesn't have to be
every
time - it's not a permanent decision. We can do both on different days, even do both during the same event!
It is all life. We are alive and living it either way.
Let's observe and participate, whether at this moment we are taking it all in - or going all out - while enjoying the spaces, places, and people - from either perspective.
