Do You Celebrate Your Birthday?

I have a soft spot for birthdays. That day you enter the world, new, soft, and loved. You often hear, “Live each day as if it was your last.”

Suleika Jaouad, author, musician, and artist, believes that is terrible advice. As she faced overcoming, more than once, and again recently, acute leukemia, she shifted to:

I try to live every day as if it was my first.

I like her approach.

When we come into the world, our eyes are open to wonder—the glint of sunlight across the room, a laugh, a tickle, a warm embrace—become the stuff that makes us smile. Then we grow up.

We forget to watch the ants marching one by one, single file across the gray, cold, concrete. Sunrises are lost in the shuffle of packing school lunches, grabbing our devices as we rush to get to work on time. Every minute of the day becomes a race to achieve more, acquire more, produce more.

When did the magic of those first days disappear like vapor? Gone, forgotten, until we, too, are gone.

I have another birthday this week. Cheers! Not for the presents or even the best wishes. But rather, I have another day to live my life as if it is my first.

I can look you in the eye with wonder and appreciation, trusting in your kindness and humanity. While the world is full of danger, uncertainty, and hand-wringing despair, I will continue to believe in those first days, full of hope, promise, and possibility.

Me, on the day I turned five.

A sepia-toned photograph of the author on her fifth birthday in a checked dress stands next to a decorated birthday cake on a table, surrounded by greenery in the background.

And me, 71 years later.

Still, full of wonder.

The author with short silver hair wears a striped shirt and is in a warmly lit room smiles into the camera.

A song to celebrate life

The song, “I Lived,” was inspired by a young fan of One Republic, Bryan Warnecke. Bryan lives with cystic fibrosis, but he doesn’t allow it to keep him from living each day as if it were his first. Ten years since the song’s release and video, Bryan keeps going!

Find yourself a little wonder

“Tap into your childlike sense of wonder. Young children are in an almost constant state of awe since everything is so new to them. During your walk, try to approach what you see with fresh eyes, imagining that you’re seeing it for the first time.”
― Dacher Keltner, Awe: The New Science of Everyday Wonder and How It Can Transform Your Life

A vibrant Monarch butterfly rests on bright orange flowers, showcasing its striking patterned wings against a blurred green background.

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And always—