I think that most of us like to consider ourselves spontaneous. At the very least we all enjoy mauling over the prospect of spontaneity. Packing up everything and whisking ourselves away to a tropical island, being blown by the wind, a rambler making way as a traveler of the earth getting by on the kindness of others and wits and charm. Like many grand ideas, spontaneity has always been best practiced with me in the fanciful places of my mind and not in the actions of this not very well travelled individual before you.  True spontaneity, at least the kind that Hollywood portrays, is really less being spontaneous and more having access to large amounts of money. Yea, I would love to hike about the globe without a care in the world and experience life as it was truly meant to be experienced. I also want to retire one day, have a home, be debt free and make sure that my wife and kids will be ok one day if I am gone.

Having said all of this I want to let it be known that I do consider myself to be quite spontaneous. Spontaneity can mean a lot of things, to me it is more of an ability to role with the punches. It’s to spend a day cleaning the basement that is now covered in poop because the sewer backed up or to cancel a planned fancy dinner date to grill out at home because of a rare warm spring night. Every day we are given opportunities to exercise spontaneous thinking, actions and attitudes. How well we deal with the curveballs that life sends at us dictate our actions, thoughts, attitudes and ultimately how happy we are in our lives. So I am fighting to be more and more spontaneous. To be more ready for when my plan was to watch the game, but my (future) son wants to spend time playing the game. To be prepared for when I am ready for a night out with friends and Anna is sick so we stay
home. For when I desire A and life gives me B. Finding fun in the common stuff, the bad stuff, the hard stuff. That is spontaneity at its finest. And to be able to master it would be to begin to understand how to live life at its finest.