In some ways, I am surprised at what I miss every day.

What we ALL miss every day.

I understand how easy it is to miss something.

I know why it happens.

At the end of day, I try to recall if I saw anything worth remembering. Did I hear anything that bring me comfort somewhere down the road? Did I take part in something that made a difference to someone else’s life?

Too often, we walk past little moments and never even realize we missed them.

We are too busy walking straight ahead, never bothering to turn our head to the right, to the left, or even turn around to see what else is going on. Yet this is the world — go forward and go fast.

Six years ago, I fell in love.

I fell in love with something I had missed the majority of my life and if I did my math right, I missed over 15,000 of them.

15,000 times that I dismissed this single thing as unimportant.

15,000 moments that could have been captured.

15,000.

Since then, I have still missed a few here and there, but I appreciate each even more.

And I don’t want to miss one more. Not even one.

You see, this one thing means something to me now.

It inspires me.

There are so many emotions held in this one thing that it is hard to believe that something so simple can impact me the way it does.

Most of you dismiss it too.

Most of you expect it and never really take in the bigger meaning behind it.

That’s okay, too.

In fact, I would be very surprised if any of you felt this way about…  

A sunrise.

A simple sunrise.

Something that you have, no doubt, seen before in your lifetime at least once.

When I fell in love with the rising of the sun each morning as it greeted me with open arms and its warm glow, I never saw it coming. (Truth be told, I didn’t expect a lot of things that year that happened.)

The sun doesn’t “think” about what it needs to do — it just does it. It doesn’t ask permission and it isn’t afraid of what comes next. It just does what it was made to do.

To shine.

To provide warmth.

To help sustain life.

To inspire.

Wait…what?

The sunrise doesn’t set out to inspire…it is just the after effect of what the sunrise does for me.

In it, I find faith…faith to handle whatever this day brings.

I find hope…hope to make a difference in the lives of others.

I find a beginning…a beginning that I can build upon.

I find a choice…a choice to make this day the best one yet.

This morning, I again felt it. It hit me in such a way, that I had to stop and gaze at it for a while. I even pointed it out to my friend who was with me. I think she fell in love with it a little too. If I hadn’t looked up and to my right, I would have missed it. She would have too.

It’s not difficult. It’s not expensive. It’s not taking up more time in our day.

Pretending that the little moments in life don’t matter is a lie we tell ourselves to convince us to not want more. To not believe in something that can’t be seen. To hide our emotions and just move about our day.

It is the experience of life that we treasure most…it is in the awareness of life itself that reminds us of our own wants and the choices we make…it is in the acceptance that no one is guaranteed another sunrise.

Not you.

Not me.

And maybe that’s why even witnessing another one reminds me of just how special those forgotten moments really are.

Don’t be in such a hurry to get from one point to another…stop and take a look around you once in a while. Watch normal, every day life unfold around you and take it in. Find the beauty in the simple things and be thankful for the small reminders that show up one every now and then. Life is too short to miss any more inspirational moments.

Michelle A. Homme 2016 ©