WHAT ARE YOU FILLING UP YOUR SPACE WITH?

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Yesterday, I found myself looking at google memory notification on my phone from 2 years ago. As I looked at the photos which happened to be from my friend’s wedding, I was prompted to check the other images from the event as well as other saved photos around that period. I was carried away for about 2 hours deleting pictures, videos from my phone over a 2-year period. In total, I deleted more than 2,100 images and I still had more to delete except that time was not on my side.

This got me thinking. I have been having a challenge with space on my google drive as it has been showing me that it’s full. And yet, I have filled up my space with all kinds of irrelevant images including screen shots, pictures of shoes, pictures of crowds I don’t even know at weddings, graduations, parties, etc.

This moment reminded me of my life as well. I fill up my days with activities which do not add any value to my life or those of others and end up coming to the end of the day tired and feeling like I have not accomplished anything. 

I complain that there is no time to do such things as spending time my wife, calling my mother, siblings, friends or engaging in a business venture, etc and yet have all the time and energy to browse social media, watch an entire season of a series in one weekend as well as check and micro-manage my team. In much the same way that there didn’t seem to be enough memory on my google drive to add more images to it.

It is similar with life, there doesn’t seem to be enough time to do the things we truly love and would like to undertake or experience. But this is more so because much of our limited time is taken up by less trivial matters of life such as working at jobs we don’t like, being stuck in traffic, aimless browsing on social media or watching Netflix to get rid of our boredom. 

This is my one and only life I have, the only space I got and its time to eliminate the meaningless activities and focus on what truly matters. Let me watch out on the activities (photos) which are occupying my time (space) so that I don’t come to the end of my life with a clutter of meaningless moments or experiences.

I end by quoting Lucius Seneca, a Roman philosopher who wrote the following words more than 2000 years ago which stand true to this day:

“It is not that we have a short time to live, but that we waste a lot of it. Life is long enough, and a sufficiently generous amount has been given to us for the highest achievements if it were all well invested.”

“So it is: we are not given a short life (space) but we make it short, and we are not ill-supplied but wasteful of it.”

 

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