The purpose of life, after all, is to live it, to taste experience to the utmost, to reach out eagerly and without fear for newer and richer experience. -Eleanor Roosevelt

I have a milestone birthday coming up and what I’ve learned is that stuff will never be a substitute for experience. It’s an illusion to think things will ever be able to fill up what’s lacking in our life. My usual birthday routine has been to buy myself a special present, something extravagant. But this year I find myself not wanting anything, in fact all I want to do is get rid of the glut of stuff already in my life. What I really want this birthday are more meaningful moments. Something that can’t be bought, but that can be cultivated. Experiences are the antidote to what’s expected, to boring routines, longing and emptiness. We are responsible for the content and quality of our lives. The truth is no amount of stuff is going to fill that hole of deep wanting. In fact, it’s not about stuff at all, it’s about the depth and breadth of our daily experiences and how we integrate what we learn from them into our lives. That’s how we protect and nourish what is most vital to us.

There is an art to creating more out of our lives and it requires us to look at everything in a different light. If we can see the world in a new way, or with an alternate attitude, we can begin to see a deeper way of being in the world, past the superficial surface and the regular rounds of the day. We do this by living outside our ordinary routine. This little trick dispels the darkness and endless repetition. It helps to open our eyes to other options about what’s possible. New ideas, new terrain, new foods, friends, all bring a freshness and feeling of fullness that the things we crowd our lives with never could. We have to experience what the world has to offer in order to inspire a new sense of wonder within, we can’t buy it, it’s not for sale.

My husband and I recently went to a concert on a whim, we arrived and it was sold out, but somehow within ten minutes we were given two tickets and were inside drinking a glass of wine waiting for the concert to begin. There is an effortless ease of energy we awaken when we are naturally in the moment, it restructures old habits of being. We floated around in that experience for the next two weeks. It is amazing how a small, unexpected adventure recusitates the everyday routine of life. That is the real gift.

This year I am heading to a Japanese spa with my husband to celebrate. I can’t think of anything better to nourish my soul and set a new course to a more thoughtful life. New experiences can’t be bought. It’s all about our perspective, we have to engage them, and welcome them in. Any experience we embrace can give us the opportunity to open up and explore more of life. And all of these outer explorations only fuel our inner exploration, they go hand in hand. And somehow I’ve found accumulating less soothes the soul. All the things we’ve accumulated won’t make a difference if we don’t have the eyes to see a new way of life or the enthusiasm to really live it.

Here’s to experiencing greater possibilities that life has to offer.

kb