you are alive, but are you living?

Dress: Motel, Jacket: H&M, Booties: Topshop

Dress: Motel, Jacket: H&M, Booties: Topshop

A few weeks ago, my boyfriend and I decided to stroll around the Distillery District in Toronto before catching the last weekend of the Light Festival once sundown came. Lining the Insta-worthy cobblestone streets of the Distillery, there are several trendy bars, restaurants and shops to check out, as well as several art galleries if that’s more your thing.

On our little adventure in the Distillery, I paired this dark floral dress with this oversized moto jacket (also worn here). It was actually freezing cold out once it became dark, so I had the jacket zipped all the way up (not cute paired with this dress haha), but you gotta do what you gotta do, right? I purposely wore this dress to show that florals are not only reserved for spring/summer (I know it’s officially spring now, but it’s still cold out so it’s not spring yet in my mind).  Florals can definitely work in the colder weather too, especially when it’s printed on a dark background like my dress. Just layer it with a jacket, tights, and boots and you can easily winterize an otherwise summery piece.

So this week’s song is another one by The Maine. I know I’ve already featured them twice on this blog, but I can honestly say that they’re the one band who’s music I feel like I can relate to like no other. This week’s song is called “How Do You Feel?” and it comes off their latest album release. I’ve had this song on repeat quite a lot over the last two weeks, and the line “you are alive, but are you living” in particular reminded me of how lucky I am to be alive on this planet.

In particular, once I heard this, I also remembered something I read in The Book of Awakening by Mark Nepo. In his very first passage, Nepo reminds us of what a rarity it is that we are all alive as human beings in this universe. Out of all the millions of different species of animals, plants, and minerals, how often is it that we get to be alive on this planet with the consciousness that we as humans are so blessed to possess? If I wasn’t a human being, I could have been a mouse, or an ant, or a cloud. So what a miracle it is that I’m here, alive and able to write blog posts about my style and music, and other human beings like yourself, are able to read and react to it. Tomorrow I could be dead and become an ant, but right now, I’m a healthy and alive human being.

It’s so important that we take advantage of this rare opportunity, making sure that every moment we’re here, we spend doing things that are fulfilling for our souls.  For me, that includes things like meditation and yoga, eating carbs more than once in a while, listening to and discovering new music, writing this blog, and going after my dreams.  In doing all this, I have found myself to be more grateful of the opportunity I have here on earth, simply by making the conscious effort to do the things that make my heart sing.  I think we all owe it to ourselves to make sure we’re living the best possible life that we can for ourselves. Because what a shame it would be if we weren’t.