SKIP IT

If you’re an adult ( over 21) reading this, allow me to ask you four simple questions. 

 1.) When was the last time you skipped ?

 2.) When was the last time you jumped ( with both feet together) ?

3.) Were your answers longer than ten years ago ? 

 4.)  WHY ?

Generally, when I ask these questions to a studio audience the overwhelming response to the fourth question is….” Cause now we’re “adults“.   ( As if that is supposed to make it okay.)  When I ask  audience members to give me words associated with, or conjoured up, by the image of “skipping”, I get things like, Happy, Joyful, Energetic, etc. and when I ask them to associate words with “jumping” I usually get things like, Playful, Fun, Carefree, etc.  Now my question is this.  If these two things, “skipping and jumping” are associated with these wonderful attributes why would we, or anyone else for that matter, not want to continue doing them ?!?  Yet, sadly to say, virtually every individual calling himself or herself an “adult” no longer “skips” or “jumps”.  Why ? Because we’d feel foolish ? We’d attract attention ? We’d be looked at as “wierd” ? Probably all the above .  Yet, one of the greatest spontaneous moments I ever experienced was in downtown Chicago.  It was on the sidewalk  of Michigan Avenue, with both sides of the street packed with the hussle and bussle of people each intently focused on his/her point of destination when suddenly, the side I was on, heard a murmur, then it got progressively louder, and as I looked, I saw the crowd parting, and there, about twenty feet away, coming towards me, I saw a young Mom and Dad with their small three or four year old child between them, all holding hands, beaming broad smiles, skipping together while saying,…. ” Excuse us, excuse us please, coming through,  etc.”   It was such a joy to see, like the parting of the Red Sea. The crowd just opened up as this magical trio came skipping through.  Now, who knows what motivated them to do what they did, perhaps a reunion, a birthday celebration whatever, that’s not important. What is important is that they had the courage to be themselves, to ” just be”  to ” be in the moment”  blocking everything and everyone else out. What a beautiful moment in time that was, not just for them, but for the multitudes watching them. As I looked around at the faces, of the watchers virtually every individual had a smile on his/her face, many lost in their own reconnection of what it used to feel like to be comepletely free and happy.    YET, interestingly enough, after the trio had past, and each person had come back to “reality” suddenly I saw people shaking their heads, rolling their eyes, and saying “stereo typical things” such as, ” How silly”  or “You’d think they’d watch where they’re going”  or “Some people never grow up !”  …with others nodding in approval because it seemed that was the acceptable reaction of  “civilized adults”.  Yet, it was that last phrase, the “Some people never grow up” that stayed with me and I thought  “How wonderful” to think that we “have a choice”  to “grow up” or not.

  So, bottom line…. if you were to ask me  “When was the last time I skipped?”  I’d have to answer  “Today”….and I hope tomorrow and the day after that, because I don’t want to “grow up” not entirely anyway. Not if it means  putting away those very things, that by our own admission bring, joy, happiness, playfulness, energy, etc. to my life.  What is even more interesting,  I’ve learned that “skipping” and “jumping” actually revitalize the body, providing of course, you are physically able to do it.  So, stop being the adult you “think” you should be. Start being the adult you know you can be. It’s your life. Live it your way!