Reflections

Getting Too Caught Up

/ still a dreamer / 2 Comments

It’s so easy to get caught up in how much there is to do – how much work, how much running around, how much taking care of the kids or pets … how much, how much, how much. And serenity, inner peace, is out the window faster than a flash. Here’s where Monday morning often starts … already running with a mile long list of things to do.

It really is kind of depressing. We wake up and feel calm for about 2 seconds, then the to-do-list, the who-needs-what, comes crashing into our consciousness. How to stop this free fall of impending needs of others, our work, etc. that comes crashing on our heads so early? I do know the answer, but we really do have to do it.

And that is to take – or make – some small bit of time for ourselves. Whether it’s a short meditation, maybe a walk, journal, or doing whatever it is that centers us – in my case this morning, it’s writing a bit on my blog – it’s something to beat back the incessant demands of too much to do. All that stuff to do is not going away, but we can get them in a place where they are more in perspective and we can breathe. Take a deep breath … and let it go.

I’m writing this for me as much as for you who might be reading this … I’m still on the path of learning. And no matter how insistent all these demands are – unless they truly are life and death – we can be in a better space in how we look at it. Though it sometimes gets lost in all the crazy busy-ness, I always remember what Louise Hay says on her tapes – the only thing we can change is our thoughts. We can’t change the car-pooling, the amount of work our job demands, the daily errands, etc., but we can change how we think about them. It takes practice, but the getting too caught up in them is costly to our well-being.

So today I’m writing a little … I’m taking a deep breath … and starting all that stuff.

Have a great day!

Simple Words of Wisdom

/ still a dreamer

No doubt, you find and read books that inspire you, whether you read them on an ongoing basis, re-read them, or discover them for the first time. Same here. One of my favorites, that I fall back into periodically, is Simple Abundance – A Daybook of Comfort and Joy by Sara Ban Breathnach. Having read it from cover to cover when I first received this as a gift many years ago, I now always have it nearby and let it fall open from time to time to see what Ms. Ban Breathnach has to say on a particular occasion.

I thought I would share with you a line of inspiration that she wrote …  and an example of how the seemingly simplest thought can say it all —

“Learning to shrug is the beginning of wisdom.”

Chronos vs. Kairos

/ still a dreamer

How interesting that chronos and kairos should appear in my reading materials in so close a time frame. Not long ago, I read Madeleine L’Engle writing about it. Then on October 12th, in one of my favorite books, Simple Abundance – A Daybook of Comfort and Joy, Sarah Ban Breathnach addressed it. And as always, these “chance” messages were of particular relevance to my life at the moment, and my feelings of far too much to do in too little time all too often. Might you find yourself in here, too?

Ms. Ban Breathnach defines chronos as how we try and control time – clocks, calendars, datebooks, agendas, beepers, etc. Chronos is time at its worst and a delusion of grandeur – it is the world’s time.

Kairos, on the other hand, is time at its best. Kairos is transcendence, infinity, joy, passion, the sacred. Kairos let’s go and allows us to escape our own confines. It is spirit’s time.

We, who never seem to have enough time, are at the mercy of chronos … or allow ourselves to be. But we need kairos so desperately. We do already know it – it’s any time when we have been so wondrously involved in what we are doing at the moment that we lose track of worldly time and just are. And there we find joy, rapture, oneness with our own spirit.

But how to be in more kairos? Ms. Ban Breathnach recommends the following:

“* By slowing down
* By concentrating on one thing at a time
* By going about what we are doing as if it were the only thing worth doing at that moment
* By pretending we have all the time in the world, so that our subconscious will kick in and make it so
* By making time
* By taking time.”

She says, “It only takes a moment to cross over from chronos into kairos, but it does take a moment. All that kairos asks is our willingness to stop running long enough to hear the music of the spheres.

“Today be willing to join in the dance.

“Now you’re in kairos.”

Where Is the Joy?

/ still a dreamer

If you are a woman and you are reading this, then there’s a good chance that you are struggling to find the joy in life. Today’s pace, especially for women, is more frenetic than ever.  Many of us are working, maintaining a home for ourselves and others, raising children, and running like crazy. We are often overwhelmed and exhausted. Despite all this, we may still be reasonably happy, or … we may be downright miserable.

I do believe our natural soul state is one of love and joy. And that it easily gets lost in the pace of everyday life. As I am reading Marianne Williamson’s book, A Woman’s Worth, I find myself dwelling on this section where she writes about joy. She writes that joy is what happens when we recognize how good things are, how beautiful and amazingly powerful we are as women. And she adds that we can create joy in our daily life; we can decide to be happy. It may take our attention and some effort to focus on this, but it is possible.

I know, and perhaps you have, too, the feeling of real joy. For me, it is a distinct feeling that all is right in the world; all is well and perfect at that moment. The fact is that we can experience this feeling so much more often by focusing on the good, and on the amazing beings we, as women, are. I want more joy; how about you? Reading A Woman’s Worth is just fueling that desire for joy right now. This might be a book you’d be interested in if you’d like to discover more of your own joy and your own worth in the world.

Without ever getting into a women’s rights kind of attitude, but always staying in the positive and the uplifting, Williamson writes about how women have lost their place and been kept down throughout much of history, and conversely, of all we are and can be.

The passage that I love in this section is as follows. “A joyful woman, merely by being, says it all. The world is terrified of joyful women. Make a stand. Be one anyway.”

Bliss Boulevard

/ still a dreamer

As I was returning from an early morning errand today, I passed a street sign that I had never noticed before … Bliss Blvd.  I looked at it with a kind of longing. That’s where I want to live. Wouldn’t you?

It’s a small side street and easy to miss as it comes up immediately after one turns left onto a well-travelled route, and I couldn’t help but wonder what it meant, that after all these years of passing it, I just noticed it today. I do always take these kinds of things as signs, and not the literal ones. So why did I just see this today?

From numerous nights of poor and/or interrupted sleep, I’m on edge. Things of minor importance become of disproportionate significance; routine but unexpected noises make me jump. And things that may normally cause me some worry cast an even greater shadow. I know sleep will help. But what I also know I need to do in these times is to just let go.

Letting go of worries often means letting go of the illusion of control. The only thing we truly have control over is our own thoughts. The rest – people,  animals, events – on both personal and global scales – is nothing we can control. Sometimes we can only stand by and watch things unfold. Sometimes we can influence things in a positive, (or negative), way. However, others are on their own path, and we don’t ever really know,  though we may glimpse it, what that path is for them – the joy, the pain, the confusion, the triumphs – but it is their path.  Ideally, we can bring to others the best of ourselves and then let the rest go.

So, I thought today, in this sleep-fractured state, that I would pack up a little black bag of worries, control, fear and all that negative crap, and surrender it on my way to a more blissful destination. I’m sure there’s a better night’s sleep to be had there and an easier time of it. And I have children’s books to write and illustrate. I’m headed for Bliss Blvd. Isn’t that where you’d like to be, too?