I think most of us do look forward to our own birthdays, we look forward to our special day, a day in which we can relax, we can take the foot off the gas pedal and indulge ourselves. Other than the fact that your birthday is the day you entered the world, it is rather arbitrary in nature. I find that the significance of birthdays has been overstated, might I think that it is a society constructed conspiracy to slack off. And the worst thing is, this slacking off is somehow, someway socially acceptable, we see it as the day we can unwind a day to let ourselves go but that is a mistake for such actions might serve to backtrack your progress or perhaps much worse, destroy the momentum that you had going previously. Imagine that you have been religiously sticking to your workout schedule, while eating healthy food only. You are on track to reaching your fitness goals, yet on the day of your birthday you discard whatever reservations you have to the back of your mind and gorge on the most sugary, salty and fatty of foods like there is no tomorrow. The next day you feel like you are in a daze, you become disorientated, you feel sluggish, going to hit a workout seems impossible. As a result you lie down in your bed for the rest of the day, scrolling through your phone and getting nothing done. What are waste, what a tragedy.
Visualise the alternative. On the day of your birthday, once the alarm clock rings you immediately spring out of your bed, ready to take on whatever challenges that are foolish enough to face you. You attack your daily activities with even more strength and motivation. You engage in the hardest and most gruelling workout of your entire fitness career. You were panting throughout the whole bout of exercise; your muscles are as sore as they can be. With this sense of achievement, you spend the rest of your day in the most productive manner. Wouldn’t that be a birthday to remember? We need to reframe our conceptualisation of birthdays in our own mind. It is not a day of sitting idly by and immersing oneself in merriment. It should be a day of suffering, a day of pain, a day of hardship like never before. If one were to peg any sense of significance to birthdays, let that be the day in which you reborn, the day in which you improve yourself like never before.
Some might regard this as extreme, as insane, as foolhardy. They might accuse me of being some kind of workaholic, a man that is all too consistently on the grind. Heed not their derogatory tone, for you should take such comments as compliments, as testaments to your commitment. Heed not those who cast aspersions your way, for their words are laced with envy and malice and ultimately made in bad faith. Heed not the mumblings and idle talk of the average man, for their advice will only lead you down the path of averageness.
One’s own birthday puts time in perspective. Use it as an opportunity to reflect over one’s own progress over the year, where is one in his/her life, did they imagine themselves to be in this position? What progress have you made towards your goals? I should think that birthdays should be regarded as a reminder of the need for progress, to improve oneself. A signpost to assess yourself and your past performance.
In a nutshell, spend your birthdays well. The time will inexorably pass. When you go to sleep on your birthday, will you pat yourself on the back in satisfaction, telling yourself that this is the best birthday ever, experiencing this sense of pride at the immense progress that you have made on that day, or will you feel a profound sense of regret, at the knowledge that you squandered away your valuable time? I do hope that you choose the former.