Living our lives for external praise

We live our lives for external praise

We get up every day and scurry through the maze

With our brains on autopilot and our eyes a glaze

Running our bodies into the 24-7 blaze

Contributing to our brains perpetual fog and haze

We tell ourselves its just a phase

And yet we have not slept for days

Let alone go outside for some healthy rays

What is this mad craze?

We pretend to ourselves that it all slays!

Isn’t it time to question our ways?

We prefer spending our time on the internet and eBay’s

To real connection and sitting in cafes

To seeing live music, museums and plays

We care more about our next raise

To setting our hearts a blaze

And a beautiful sunset drawing our gaze

I don’t really want to rephrase

What do we fear would happen if we were to laze

Our life on hold..we create our own malaise

Constantly putting off our joy and our freedom

We put up with constant delays

In our happiness and all it conveys

We are so caught up in pleasure and all its displays

Immersing  ourselves in Netflix, 

We’ve even brought back the tv trays!

Are we keeping up with the communiques?

Happiness is an inside job.

That’s not a cliche!

Do we know the cost of this external focus and all it betrays

May we celebrate connection and cabarets

Enjoy dinners with friends drinking fabulous Cabernets

Smell the fragrance of the sweet bouquets

Drop all the heavy dossiers

And watch in wonder as the birch tree sways

And at all the magnificence nature displays

We need more than well intentions 

 and prays

We really can’t afford much greater delays