Ok, a perceptive follower of my page might notice a theme. I post a lot of pictures of sunsets. In fact, in some of the pictures I post of myself, you might just notice a picturesque sunset in the background. What is that about or why am I seem obsessed with the sunset? Well, here's the story.
So my entire life I've lived on the coast, either in Florida or Georgia, I've never lived more than about 30 minutes from the beach. For me, the most gorgeous, peaceful and picturesque location is not a beach, but rather the mountains.
Now, a few years ago, my wife and I discussed a lot about relocating and I kept saying I would love to live near the mountains somewhere.
Well, one day while driving home in the evening, I looked up and inexplicably was astonished by what I saw. I said to my wife, "Look at that!"
It is important to interject at this point, my wife already by this point in our lives has firmly come the conclusion that I am crazy. So what I was about to say had no influence on her already realizing I'm insane. I said, "Look at the clouds and the sunset! They look like mountains."
The point was that the entire time we had been talking about relocating to the mountains it was unwittingly under this idea that somehow the beauty of the mountains would break the monotony of life. However, the reality is monotony doesn't come from where you are, it comes from within you.
Basically, everything seemed routine and my surroundings seemed to lack beauty. However, the reality was it wasn't that my environment lacked beauty, it was that I wasn't paying attention to the beauty around me.
So when you see me post pictures of a gorgeous sky, it isn't that I somehow live in an enchanted kingdom of sunsets. Rather, I just started looking up and realized that incredible beauty is actually around me almost every single day.
The picture with this post was taken yesterday evening in the back parking lot of my police department. After evening shift change, every night, I walk about back and take a moment to enjoy the natural sight of the sunset occurring right in front of me, before I hit the street and night falls.
It's a subtle pause in life to remind myself beauty is always around us. We just have to be willing to look.