Living in the Now

As I approach my one year anniversary of my catastrophic fall I've been waxing philosophical, more directly today I've been thinking about how the simplest of choices can have the largest impact. I always pictured life altering events as a huge catastrophe, epic and ground shaking. My life changed because of a simple slip of my feet. That's not what I expected, I expected lights from the heavens shining down and a booming voice telling me that now everything will be different. Instead, I slipped into the change. I literally fell into it. One moment you're walking, looking for a path and then you wake up broken and bleeding and have to make some hard decisions very quickly. It's as this point where training kicks in, you're not aware that your life has changed forever, it's one of those rare occasions where you are stuck in the moment. At this moment, there is no past, there is no future, there is only right now. It's not often we live life in the Now, we constantly think how we wish we could or wish we hadn't, or think about the next step. At that moment, there was nothing but now...my training was there for me, I had only one train of thought, I have to survive!!! That's it...Survival was the only option. While I would never wish this experience on anyone I have to admit it was the most religious experience I have ever had. My mind was clearer than it has ever been. As I said, there was no past, there was no future, there was only here and now.

I chose the road I went down. I could have bowed out, kept my leg, spent my life at a desk. To me, that was much more of a sacrifice than my damaged leg, I could give up my leg or give up what makes me happy...it's an easy choice when you look at it that way. A leg is flesh and bone, happiness is much more abstract, Mark Twain once said the secret to a happy life is to make your vocation your vacation...I had achieved this for the most part as a paramedic. So, while the choice I made is difficult an I have a long uphill fight to go, I couldn't have lived with myself if I didn't try. So here I am, I've had my prosthetic for a little over a month, I've went from walker to cane to taking a few steps at a time on my own. I'm getting stronger daily and continue my fight. I'm about to start working out more and strengthening myself for the battles ahead, all while trying to take just a few minutes a day to live in the Now. Try it, it's life altering.