Anniversary, a day to remember

Anniversary, a day to remember 

We all have anniversaries of some sort. Wedding, graduation, death of a loved one, moving into a new home, or some sort of commemorative date for remembrance . Each has its own significance and celebrated in its own way depending on traditions and rituals of our families, cultures and more over ourselves. It is a time for reflection. It is a time to pause and reassess the past and see how it plays into the present and therefore gauge or plan for the future. 

Take wedding anniversaries for example. It is a time to rejoice of another  year passing of a couple being together. They remember the hard year that they have witnessed, and all the fun that they have had, and in that communion of being together and recollecting events,there is a lot of cathartic release of bad energy allowing the entry of good vibrations and energy to enter the new season. Some may look at it like drudgery or simply blow off the fact that another year  has passed, but in reality simply brushing the date aside or stuffing it into a drawer does not help the experience. Regardless of the number of years, 1, 5, 10, 15, 20....50 the number only serves to reinforce the lastingness and strength  of the relationship versus the number of years spent tolerating the spouse. By letting go and openly discussing the troubles, we actually allow the exit of the negative out of the relationship. By discussing the past events of fun and good times, we plant the seeds for the upcoming years harvest of a healthier and productive relationship.

Take graduation anniversaries. It is a time to remember finite days or finite years of hard work, late nights, sacrifice, and due diligence with the conclusion being a happy finish and a long waited goal accomplished. We all have some sort of graduation to look forward to. Be it graduation from school, higher level training courses, or even as simple as diapers, it is still a day to remember. The success was noted by the person experiencing the work in progress, be it a child, and adult or even an infant or toddler. We do not call them baby steps for nothing !

Take death anniversaries. This is usually a time of mourning, a time for sadness, and no celebration. Unlike the other sorts of anniversaries, we usually spend time brooding, but we do spend that time remembering. Instead of remembering the bad, why not rejoice in the good fact that the deceased person is free? Instead of remembering the date of death, note this date to be the one of physical freedom. The date that they joined their other prior deceased  loved  ones. A date of no more physical or mental suffering in the material world. The date should remember a life lived, not a life gone. If you bring forth the remembrance of goodness of that individual you then learn to celebrate their life and their passing and not dismiss their life and only focus on the end. 

A shift of focus changes our awareness. Our shift of awareness changes into peace. Our shift into peace brings about enlightenment. Do we ever have a date that we can say we attained enlightenment,that we can celebrate just the same? A date that we can recall and remember every minute, hour, day, week, month and year, a date that we harnessed freedom from our troubles. If that date occurs for you at this moment and you stay in that state of awareness and joy, then it does not become necessarily an anniversary but a whole time period of celebration. Remembering the date of enlightenment is interesting as it does also let go of the past ills through introspection, but a lot faster. It gives one a unique perspective of time vis a vie  time standing still. Awareness of the moment and evolution after hard work into the state of enlightenment relinquishes the feeling of time and its persecution or its mastery over you. Time then neither exists nor it ever did, and so the celebration anniversary is not of the date but of the experiential state of heightened existence. Just like traditional anniversaries when everyone comes and celebrates with you, it would be great if everybody has this enlightenment anniversary, it would be a time to party indeed. 

Wishing you a happy anniversary, in every aspect of your life.