I am so grateful tonight that I don’t have anyplace to be or anyone who is clamoring for my attention this evening. Every once in a while I get so overly busy that I meet myself coming and going, running myself ragged. I find that at times such as this I need to find a way to push the pause button in my life, stop, and catch my breath. Unfortunately there really isn’t a simple button to push that slows the pace of life, let alone stops it. So it is incumbent upon me to take steps to exercise what one writer calls, “extreme self care.” I was advised recently by a friend that I need a significant other in my life–someone who could assist me in attending to my own needs rather than ignoring them, which is at times what I have tended to do. And while I admit that it might be nice to have someone else looking after me for a while, in the here and now of this present moment, I must do that for myself.
It’s one of those interesting paradoxes–the notion that we are intricately and intimately connected to all beings on the planet, and yet at the same time we are on our own, responsible for our individual lives–the decisions we make, the actions we take, the rules we break (okay, I couldn’t resist the rhyme.) The Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. said, “We are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly.” Yes, we are connected and dependent upon one another for our very survival. And yet, in the final analysis, I need to attend to my own needs, live by my own light, tend my own fire so to speak.
It has been interesting reading some of my old posts from a year ago as I traveled across the country from California to Maryland. Last year on this day my brother and I had driven over 880 miles from Salt Lake City, Utah to Lincoln Nebraska: the second of three legs with the two of us and Honor before I dropped him off in Indiana to make the remaining 600 driving solo. There’s nothing quite like a long road trip like that for providing incredible bonding time. My brother and I literally talked our way across the country. I am still moved by his incredible generosity in taking time away from his job and family to ensure that I made it safely across the country. Could I have done it myself? Yes, I could have. But it would have been a much longer, more intensely taxing , and way less enjoyable experience to have driven those 2900 miles alone.
So as I fast forward to today I am thinking about how much I have managed on my own over the last few years. Has my journey been more challenging because I have done much of it solo? No doubt. I have learned over time to reach out and ask for help or at the very least invite support and encouragement from a person here and there. While I might think about that more in the near term, for right this moment, I need to pay attention to and take care of myself. For now that means managing my time and energy in ways that leave a little left in my tank to spend on caring for myself. I’m grateful for the reminder to slow myself down and refresh myself. Now it’s up to me to make it happen. May it be so!
