It seems like a minute ago there were ice cycles glistening on the trees outside my kitchen windows, melting in tiny droplets from the bright sun. A promise of a spring hovering somewhere nearby.
I must have blinked and missed it, because now outside that very same window the blistering sun is bearing down on a garden full of weeds and drooping tomatoes wondering how in the world July is hanging on the horizon.
This year is a speeding train thundering down the track, stopping nowhere and waiting for no one. I have a nagging urge to start my Christmas cards now because I have a feeling when I blink again, there will be Salvation Army bells ringing at the grocery store.
It steals my breath away.
There are days that moments after I write my daily plan, it is obsolete and flying out the window. Days when the organization of the past just doesn’t cut it and I am flying by the seat of my pants and thanking God above that someone told me Improve class would really come in handy some day.
There are other days that without my morning and evening routines firmly in place, I would be lost, floundering about like a fish, tossed on the shore in a storm.
It pays to be flexible. I take my guidance from the sea. I try to relax into the larger waves of life, trying hard not to fight them, staying focused and alert and on top of things; then calming, as the waves get smaller, trying to remember to take those moments of peace before the next set starts up again. Always knowing they will come. Not being knocked off guard by the next set of waves.
Ebb and flow, the balance of life.
It’s hard to keep that balance. It’s an easy thing to lose and this year especially, it’s been hard to hang on to. Find it in one area, it slips in another. Coaching’s going great, writing fiction? Sure…great…doing it every day like clock work. Exercise, diet?… yep…finally back on track. House? Yep..good…family good…
Then one day John asks casually… haven’t seen a post at LLI for awhile… Taking a break or something?
Um…yea, has it really been that long?
Time slipping through my fingers again. Why is it always the important things…and sometimes people… we let slip away?
Weeds in the garden, lack 0f posts at LLI, haven’t touched a paintbrush in months…journal buried under a pile of papers… for me, when life turns up the speed, I lose my meditative edge and forget those stolen moments that were just for me. I keep working on the ones that are geared toward helping others improve their lives or producing some work of art for payment, or church or a project for an interesting cause. These are my focus while in the mean time my own inner light is spinning precariously closer to burn out.
Been there done that before. Not interested in ever going back there again. Although I think my “take on everything I see” type of personality leaves me a prime target for burn out, I have had to deal with this lesson a few times now. It’s a faster walk around the block. I am quicker to see the warning signs flashing around me.
What I need back are my stolen morning moments. Plucked away from the first drops of morning dew before the sun has time to steal them back again. My morning meditation time and private musings gives me the creative juice to send it out again into the rest of the day.
I picked up my journal today. The pages that stared back at me accusingly had a date on it that I am too ashamed to share. This from a woman who faithfully wrote in it most every morning for years. It felt great to pour the details of my days back into the little book where they belong and get all of that nonsense out of my head. It may seem hard to believe, but I think it even slows that rushing train down a little bit.
It restores balance. The ebb and flow.
And leaves room in my head to go focus on other things. Like coming here.
It feels good to be back.
