If I’ve learned one thing about myself since being in Costa Rica, it’s this: I am terrible at hiking. Absolutely the worst. I am so slow. This is partly because I’m out of shape and hiking is hard, but mostly because I stop every 5 seconds to look up at the trees. If you’ve never just stopped and stared straight up at the branches, do it sometime. The sunlight comes through the leaves in the most simple and beautiful way. The problem is, it’s impossible to stare straight up and walk at the same time. So I stop…a lot. I don’t understand how people can just walk right on through forest or up a mountain and miss all that is around them. I decided a leisurely stroll is more my speed.
I know you may be wondering what this has to do with anything, so let me explain.
After getting left behind countless times, I realized that I’m more easily amazed than the average person. If you’ve spent time with me, you’ve probably heard some variation of the phrase “this is the coolest thing ever” come out of my mouth. I say it a lot, and I really mean it. One day I see something cool, and then the next day brings something cooler. I’d like to think that God has given me the eyes to see his little wonders in this world.
This isn’t a new development either. When I was a kid, I used to stare outside the car window for hours and watch the power lines look like they were doing the wave as we drove by. It seems silly, but it always amazed me. From then on, I’ve gotten to go more places, meet more people, and do more things. I’m constantly reminded of this simple truth:
Life is incredible.
It really is. I mean, think about how life came to be… God made man out of dust…He spoke the world into creation! He flooded the whole earth till the mountains were under water! Read Genesis and prepare to have your mind blown at the fact that all of these things actually happened. Life didn’t get any less awesome after creation.
There are a million amazing things that blow my mind everyday, like bridges, I mean how the heck do people build these huge structures that stand in water…or what about the human brain…or how every single person on the planet is different…or how weird it is that potatoes grow under the ground…or even how water falls from the sky and we think that is completely normal! I could go on forever. The plain truth is, God gave us a world filled with mind blowing wonders.
I love to be in complete awe. To sit and think, wow God is a genius, and He created some genius people.
In all my years of being an easily amazed person, I’ve formulated this pro tip: Don’t ever let someone diminish your amazement with something by simply explaining it.
Just because we are used to it, or it can be easily explained doesn’t mean it isn’t awesome. I’ll go back to my example of rain: I obviously know all about the water cycle and have felt and seen rain many, many times in my life, but I still am baffled by the idea of it. It’s so cool. Im sure God could have watered the Earth any way he wanted, but he chose to create a giant sprinkler system in the sky. Thats amazing. Case closed.
I’m so thankful he gave me the ability to see his little wonders, because each day is filled with them. It doesn’t matter where I am in the world, or what I’m doing, I can always find something to be in awe of. Noticing these wonders keep me from just going through the motions of each day. If you feel stuck in your days, or worn down by life, practice blowing your own mind. Really, try it sometime. If you want to get a head start now, just think about how all the little symbols on this page carry meaning and by putting certain ones together I conveyed a coherent thought. I wonder if the first person to assign letters to certain sounds thought it would stick. Well it did, and here I am now. See it’s as simple as that. Look for those things that are beautiful or weird or remind you of how big God is. These are the things that bring us closer to him and make life exciting. He doesn’t want us to look past the little wonders he puts in our path each day.
If you get one thing from this blog, get this: The world is a cool place, you just have to pay attention, and be willing to stand in amazement instead of brushing past the beauty.
Stop, and look up.
Thanks for reading 🙂
