Don’t Do Anything That Doesn’t Give You Butterflies

Don’t do anything that doesn’t make your heart pound and head spin with emotion. Don’t do anything that doesn’t send your stomach into knots thinking about it, with a healthy mix of fear and excitement. Don’t do anything that doesn’t make you giddy with word vomit because you can’t control yourself. Don’t do anything that doesn’t give you butterflies.

Once you start doing things that don’t give you butterflies it means you aren’t passionate about it, or as passionate as you should be. Doing things that don’t flood your body with tingles means you aren’t nervous and you don’t care as much as you could.

When you start doing things you don’t care about, whatever it is, it loses its value to you. It loses its value and its importance. It becomes another thing that you have to do, it becomes routine, and it doesn’t become something that makes your knees knock with excitement.

Nerves are good. Let the nerves guide you because nerves mean you’re heading in the right direction. It means you’re about to break out of your comfort zone; you’re about to do something that makes you afraid to fail. It’s an exciting part of life.

So please, don’t do anything in life that doesn’t give you butterflies.

Don’t be with someone who doesn’t fill you with pleasure to the core, especially from the start. Don’t force a relationship because you’re lonely or you’re tired of being on your own. Those relationships won’t give you butterflies, they won’t make your stomach turn, and they won’t have you jumping up and down waiting for him to come pick you up at the front door. It won’t leave you up at night texting when you should have gone to bed hours before. It won’t leave you trying on everything in your closet because you want to make a good impression.

And even when you are in love you still shouldn’t be with someone who doesn’t give you butterflies and who doesn’t make you giddy with excitement, even after months and years of being with them because love should never be boring. Of everything in life that might be boring, your love and your relationship shouldn’t be.

I get that routine becomes part of life; we get in habits that are hard to break. We get set in our ways. We do things because they’re easy and they’re convenient, but do not make your relationship one of those things.

Surprise each other with breakfast in bed, take each other out on date and buy flowers. Go to a drive-in movie like you used to do when you were younger. Go ice-skating in the park when the snow is falling. Try new things in bed. Do whatever it takes to keep to love alive, but get butterflies in your stomach because you are so passionate about each other.

Don’t waste your time participating in activities you aren’t wildly zealous about because then you will never give it your all. You won’t want to be there and you won’t care how things turn out.

Don’t live somewhere you hate because you’ve always called it ‘home.’ Don’t spend time with people who you aren’t excited to see, even after not seeing each other for a while. Don’t work a job that makes you miserable because you don’t know what else you’d do.

Make moves. Explore. Wander off. Go on an adventure. Become who ever you want to be. The possibilities are endless in this world.

The only thing I ask is that no matter what you do in life, please don’t settle for anything less than butterflies.

Don’t do anything you’re not passionate about because when you don’t have passion, you have nothing. Don’t do things out of obligation. Don’t stay in relationships because you’re comfortable or you feel trapped. Break free. Live for you. Make yourself happy. Figure out what gives you butterflies and stick with it, and never let it go.