A mantra for the present and a Timehop from the past

Timehop app.

Every morning I’m greeted with an alert on my phone from this Timehop app I’ve downloaded. It shows you photos and statuses from Facebook that you posted exactly 1 year ago or 2 years ago or 4 years ago and so on so forth, you get the picture. This morning I was greeted by a photo of myself from this time last year. I was at my mums house for her 59th birthday holding my best friends new puppy. In the background is a drawing I did of my late father who passed away from lung cancer when he was 54.  I was thin. I had hair. I look happy. I look carefree.

I often look at these Timehop pictures and think things like “if only I had known what was round the corner” or “I wonder if the cancer was already growing inside me at that point” or “will I be around this time next year to look at my Timehop from today”? I realised that every morning I’ve been having these kinds of thoughts pushed into my head as soon as the app alert goes off.

Reflecting and drawing comparisons in life is human nature. Two of my close friends that I met through the Younger Breast Cancer Network wrote similar reflective blog posts this week, I would like to share some of their words below…

Rosie wrote about opposites, her new self compared to her old self pre cancer.
“Happy-sad. Life-death. Private-public. Busy-quiet. Life is full of opposites. We just don’t always see them.”

And Sarah wrote about her birthday, turning 34 and celebrating having a good life despite the cancer treatment she has been through.
“I don’t know what’s in my future, but right now, just for a moment, I don’t need to think about that. I can enjoy this moment of feeling happy.”

Their words made me think of a mantra that I repeat to myself nearly every hour of every day when I start to think about the future. It goes something like:

Maybe it’s time to delete that app.