I guess I've been kind of reflective recently. It's just that there was about a month where the words just would not come out. I was doing everything I could to live my life and trying to be present in each moment, and I just wasn't. Life was weighing me down and I couldn't figure out how to get out from underneath the weight.
Everything seemed to push me over an edge that I rarely ever even see.
After a particularly rough week there were finally a couple people who spoke words that I needed and pushed in the right spots that I finally took some time to not fight and force my way out of that place. Instead, I finally settled into that space and let myself feel the weight of it. And in the feeling the weight of it, I was able to start to let some of it go.
You see, life is a learning curve. I've learned some big lessons in my life, but one thing I will always be is stubborn. Wherever I learned it, I learned long ago to push through it and do what needs to be done. What needs to be done will always be done in my book. But this chapter in the book, well, it taught me to not push for a little while.
I think I was watching something recently; that or I was reading something... either way, I can visualize in my mind the lesson in the words: sit with what is going on and feel it. O! It was the show called "Addicted." The interventionist spoke about the hardest part of detoxing and rehab is learning to sit with the emotions you are pushing off with drugs.
Well, folks, my drug is the push. My drug is getting things done at all costs. I enjoy doing things and I enjoy doing what I do well (or at least to the very best that I can do it, which I hope is well for those around me). This is both a positive and a negative. I've learned in the last few years how to say "no" when it needs to be said, and I learn continuously how and where to draw lines with others. But this recent lesson was about the line within myself - learning to say no to me and learning to sit with it all.
I don't know why the words stopped. I think that for a little bit, there was literally too much going on for me to really have time to listen for them.
To give a rundown of my life recently:
- My landlord decided she is selling this residence, so I've had to find a new one, and begin to get this one ready to move out and yet still decent while it is shown.
- My second year of graduate school ended.
- Work ended, along with all the exciting end-of-year/wrap-it-up things that needed to get done (and still need to get done).
- Pentecost Sunday project.
- A long-awaited and much-needed vacation.
- Organizing the services and preaching a very busy Sunday right after said vacation.
- Dog sitting for a couple friends.
- Applying for and interviewing for jobs.
- Scholarship applications.
- Doctors appointments. Lots and lots of them and all the stuff that comes with them.
- O, and trying to live my life, see friends, do my normal work, and if I can remember, trying to eat.
This is all in the last month only. It has literally been a month that has flown and crawled by. Often not in the ways I needed it to. I'm not so sure the rest of my summer isn't going to follow a similar pattern. There is a lot I want to do this summer, including new things at the church (new ideas on that to come later!), more travel to see my family, travel to see friends, maybe just some travel to travel and have a break (mileage, anyone?)... and of course: working on my bucket list!
But for now, slowing down mentally is key.
I love living my life, but months like the last one remind me how important it is to step back on occasion; so my new self-care practice is taking at least one day every two weeks where I focus on staying in touch with myself and not necessarily the people around me. Yes, sometimes it includes people, but my goal for those days is refreshment. I'm planning things like days at the park, days at the pool, days where I just go somewhere new or different and enjoy fully what I really want to do.
Life is but a moment on the spectrum of time. And I intend to enjoy this moment, and each that I'm given. Especially with my new lesson under my belt and the necessity of practice.
We all do this from time to time. Where are you pushing too hard this week? Is there something in your life that is your addiction? What is weighing you down and is there a way for you to let yourself feel it fully so you can let it go?
The heavy things in our lives need not be so oppressive.
Everything seemed to push me over an edge that I rarely ever even see.
After a particularly rough week there were finally a couple people who spoke words that I needed and pushed in the right spots that I finally took some time to not fight and force my way out of that place. Instead, I finally settled into that space and let myself feel the weight of it. And in the feeling the weight of it, I was able to start to let some of it go.
You see, life is a learning curve. I've learned some big lessons in my life, but one thing I will always be is stubborn. Wherever I learned it, I learned long ago to push through it and do what needs to be done. What needs to be done will always be done in my book. But this chapter in the book, well, it taught me to not push for a little while.
I think I was watching something recently; that or I was reading something... either way, I can visualize in my mind the lesson in the words: sit with what is going on and feel it. O! It was the show called "Addicted." The interventionist spoke about the hardest part of detoxing and rehab is learning to sit with the emotions you are pushing off with drugs.
Well, folks, my drug is the push. My drug is getting things done at all costs. I enjoy doing things and I enjoy doing what I do well (or at least to the very best that I can do it, which I hope is well for those around me). This is both a positive and a negative. I've learned in the last few years how to say "no" when it needs to be said, and I learn continuously how and where to draw lines with others. But this recent lesson was about the line within myself - learning to say no to me and learning to sit with it all.
I don't know why the words stopped. I think that for a little bit, there was literally too much going on for me to really have time to listen for them.
To give a rundown of my life recently:
- My landlord decided she is selling this residence, so I've had to find a new one, and begin to get this one ready to move out and yet still decent while it is shown.
- My second year of graduate school ended.
- Work ended, along with all the exciting end-of-year/wrap-it-up things that needed to get done (and still need to get done).
- Pentecost Sunday project.
- A long-awaited and much-needed vacation.
- Organizing the services and preaching a very busy Sunday right after said vacation.
- Dog sitting for a couple friends.
- Applying for and interviewing for jobs.
- Scholarship applications.
- Doctors appointments. Lots and lots of them and all the stuff that comes with them.
- O, and trying to live my life, see friends, do my normal work, and if I can remember, trying to eat.
This is all in the last month only. It has literally been a month that has flown and crawled by. Often not in the ways I needed it to. I'm not so sure the rest of my summer isn't going to follow a similar pattern. There is a lot I want to do this summer, including new things at the church (new ideas on that to come later!), more travel to see my family, travel to see friends, maybe just some travel to travel and have a break (mileage, anyone?)... and of course: working on my bucket list!
But for now, slowing down mentally is key.
I love living my life, but months like the last one remind me how important it is to step back on occasion; so my new self-care practice is taking at least one day every two weeks where I focus on staying in touch with myself and not necessarily the people around me. Yes, sometimes it includes people, but my goal for those days is refreshment. I'm planning things like days at the park, days at the pool, days where I just go somewhere new or different and enjoy fully what I really want to do.
Life is but a moment on the spectrum of time. And I intend to enjoy this moment, and each that I'm given. Especially with my new lesson under my belt and the necessity of practice.
We all do this from time to time. Where are you pushing too hard this week? Is there something in your life that is your addiction? What is weighing you down and is there a way for you to let yourself feel it fully so you can let it go?
The heavy things in our lives need not be so oppressive.
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