5 days to commencing orientation. 2 weeks to its culmination and the start of Dramafest. Just 7 more weeks to the end of another hectic term, only to herald in its successor for a second term.

Since when did life become a major countdown, filled with hallmarks not serving as prominent markers for our memory but a hurdle that we have no choice around it and must painstakingly go through it.

We live life day to day, our vision only fixed on the next nearest milestone not so that we can conquer it with the best of our ability, but so that we may move on from the diminishing numbers that count themselves down.

3 months.

2 weeks.

1 day.

Hours, minutes, seconds.

Time's up! But life's not.

So why count? If everything were ever measurable in quantifiable units, we would very well be automatons programmed to live out the optimal lifestyle programmed according to specific digits. The notion of arbitrary elements in life make it more exciting to analyze and for us to judge the quality (and not quantity) of our living.  The lack of a central criteria or fixed judging system means that we will never know if we fall short of what we can become but that gives us the potential and propensity to reach for the skies, which in this case has an arbitrary limit of infinity.

Perhaps living day to day isn't such a bad concept after all, depending on how you interpret it. The way I see it, we ought to wake up each morning faced with the ultimate challenge of living the best out of today. No other countdowns but the 24 hours we are blessed with each morning. The countdown to another great day, to an even better day, and to the future. Focus on the present, because that is the best gift, and only use your recollections as a simple guide for the future. But what counts is now.

And the time is now.

And you learn to live like this better when you have a good friend to accompany you on this journey. The possibilities are countless once that happens and a bad day can always be livened up just as easily as it turned sour.