'Sunday Best'

We all have a 'Sunday Best' item. For some, it's that oh-so-special dress that makes us look (and feel) like a million dollars; for others, a particular scent; a common one is 'the good dishes' with the gold leaf border and delicate flower motif; or, in my case, a fountain pen.Whatever it is, we all have an item we keep for special occasions, for those particular days that deserve a detail of superiority, for those tasks where a simple plastic ballpen just won't do. 

 

Funny, that.

See, I have long had this 'Sunday Best' fountain pen. Now, I love fountain pens - they glide over the page; they are uniquely personal (don't share yours or the nib'll be ruined); and they reek of permanence, of times when things were built to last merely by changing the odd piece here and there. Whatever you write with a fountain pen, should be worth keeping for ever. My 'Sunday Best' pen was kept sorely for my diary writing.

But today, when I tried to use it, it wouldn't oblige. My diary writing being far from a daily activity, the cartridge was empty  and the ink in the nib had dried up, blocking any new ink from flowing. My 'Sunday Best' pen, carefully kept for a higher and lofty purpose, was simply not up to the task. It had forgotten how to be a pen, an item which is meant to be used daily, to jot down all sorts of things.The absurdity was great, I realised: I had kept this particular pen away from daily use, reserving it to retell and document my daily life! I had stunted its purpose and, in so doing, I had very nearly 'killed' the pen itself.

If we keep the best bits for 'Sunday Best', what are we doing to our experience of our life? We are, in fact, limiting our whole, purposeful, living to a seventh (if that!) of the Greatness we could be experiencing. Even worse, we might be missing out on fabulous related experiences.What's the logic in that?

So, no more 'Sunday Best's for me!

I'm going to use that pen any old time I want to, even to write down the shopping list; and the new red lipstick? I'm wearing it right now, while writing this, as it was while doing some yoga in the park, though no-one is around; and those special teabags I was given? In the mug, yum-yum chai after lunch!

Don't keep your Life's Joy on hold for Sunday Best. Make every day, every activity, worthy of being taken as special. Otherwise, you run the risk of that dress being too big/small/out of fashion before you've worn it ragged; of never inviting enough friends over for dinner lest you break a pretty saucer or spill wine on the carpet; of never writing that novel or going up on that 'open mic night' stage.

Simply Love, enJoy and Live, waiting for nothing.

Everything you are is 'The Best'.