If someone wrote an accurate biography about your life, would people marvel at the life you have lived? Would they see how you took every moment and used it to its fullest potential, or would your life be so generic that even you would feel perplexed at the lack of diversity and activity in your life? Would your entire biography begin and end with the day you collapsed onto the couch and realized that this couch potato mentality is all there could possibly be in life that is worthwhile? Except for the occasional climatic event that includes you lethargically getting off the couch to go to the bathroom that might as well be in china. People should live their life with the same amount optimism as they did when they first wanted to be a teacher, or an astronaut. Somewhere along the line people became convinced that the top was not meant for them and that there was only one general path through life. This is where many gave up, and many others fell in line with the “standard life”. Life is more fulfilling when people hit the ground running every day and passionately explore all the interesting things that life has to offer.

There are three components to a full life, energy, optimism, and passion. Energy isn’t just physical, but it’s mental too. There are morning people and there are night owls, but there are no descriptions of people that really live every minute of every day because there are so few of them. Those few people that approach every day like it’s a new start display true energy. Optimism is embracing the unexpected. It’s waking up and knowing that today will be a great day no matter what. Passion is doing what you love. If everyone used these three tools, then everyone would be in charge of their own lives and would personalize them by making them look like whatever thy wanted their lives to look like.
People don’t understand that they are the ones that can mold their life into whatever masterpiece that they want. When I was in my freshman year of high school, every day our principal would sign off of the announcements saying, “make it a great day or not, the choice is yours.” Nobody really saw the truth behind that statement. Some say that love is the key to happiness, well I say that optimism is were it all starts. By being optimistic you can see through the fog to the reality of how wonderful life is. If you are the one sculpting a life for yourself then you don’t need someone to do it for you.

Not everyone has to follow the same syllabus and do what is expected of them. If everyone did what was expected of them how would we have fashion trends and upset victories in sporting events. The best days of your life are when something unexpected happens. Everyone should welcome those opportunities that make life a little more interesting. There is a movie coming out that has a man in it that can’t say, “no” to anything. If someone offers him a bus pass, or he sees a sign that says go to Hawaii, he is obligated to do it. Though this is a very radical way of thinking, it does make people think, what if I did that. What’s sad is that it is so different and so unaccepted in our culture to go against the tide, that somebody made a movie about it.

Routine is not always bad though. Many people thrive on routine and find true happiness in what they do. However this cannot come from detesting the job that many will unwillingly drag themselves out of bed to attend.

Life is a blessing that we all get but few use. No matter how old you are, the potential for happiness is a constant in the equation of life. Do what you want to do, be what you want to be, and don’t let anyone hold you back from using that potential that has been there since day one. Have energy. Have Optimism. Have passion. Why not live your life?