Stopping to Move Forward
When my kids were young, we used to play hooky as a family and have a family day. On this day, the kids would skip school and I would put work aside and we would plan nothing. On family days, we ate our breakfast on the living room floor, a bowl of cereal and cup of hot chocolate while reading a book together or having a snuggle with our dog Balto or our two kittens Ami and Smokey. We let ourselves be free of an agenda, and they got to see their Mommy not rushing or doing. I got to see my kids joy and creativity.
As I write this, I am enjoying a “Me Day”. Last night I told my husband I was taking the day off tomorrow. “You mean you aren’t going to work out?” he asked? “No, I mean I am not going to work out, I am not going to work, I am not going to meet a friend, I am not going to get chores done. Tomorrow I am off.” I think I was explaining it more for me than for him. I needed to remind myself to avoid the temptation of being busy. To avoid making today about getting shit done that I haven’t had time to do these last few months. To avoid cleaning my desk area, or getting those pictures framed, or booking a few appointments I haven’t had time to book. I am not even going to call a friend because today is about being alone and listening to my own inner rhythms.
When I give myself space to be alone, I find my creativity rising.
My need to express, to speak, and especially to write, is always there; it’s just that the busy pace of life often mutes our creative expression. The Zoom calls, the doctor’s appointments, the house chores, the caregiving; all of it can turn down the volume of my creativity so that I can barely hear it.
Today the volume of my creativity and sound of my needs gets turned right up. Yes, I need to write, I need to sit down with my journal and let out what has been building inside me. I need more than my normal 30-minute creative check-in. I need the whole day to move at my own pace, the whole day to listen to what it is that I need, so I can finally pay attention to what is asking to come to the surface. I need to listen.
I remember going to see Oprah when she was live in Toronto a few years ago. Oprah talked about connecting to spirit, (she used the word God, but I relate more to spirit). She was saying how sometimes in her life she felt like God had left her, that she couldn’t find him. She would rapid fire all her thoughts and insecurities out there into the universe wanting an answer. I am paraphrasing badly here, but she said God answered her basically saying, “if you could stop talking for a minute I would be able to answer you. I have been here all along, but you haven’t slowed down long enough to hear me.”
So, I am paraphrasing God and Oprah, but the point was made to me so clearly that day. Stop talking and listen. Take the time to be still and connect to spirit, the spirit outside and the spirit inside. One flows from the other. There are so many answers on both life’s most simple and life’s profound questions right here in the silence. There are answers for my questions about my life direction, about the choice I have made to live in New Zealand, about the new podcast I am launching in the fall, about my husband’s health, a reassurance to my worry about my recent diagnosis of osteoporosis.
It blows me away how simply being in quiet, that clarity begins to descend on my life’s most pressing issues. How could the answers some so easily? How can the path forward suddenly become so clear?
These questions have been bubbling inside me for months, I have been asking them, but I haven’t been asking the right source. I have been asking my brain for a plan for my next life step, I have been asking my brain to reassure me about my health, I have been asking my brain to tell me my move to a new country is okay.
When I ask the right source, and when I am still long enough to listen, the answers are absolutely clear.
The power of checking in with my deepest wisdom is incredible. This wisdom lives within me and pulls from what is beyond me. I know this as spirit. This wisdom is there for me at any time, from any place, and yet it requires stillness to both ask and then to listen. The answers come quickly and very clearly. I am on the right path, there is no resistance to this statement, only support and clarity from spirit. I do not need to worry about my health, there are solutions right in front of me, osteoporosis is merely a bump on the road. My husband’s injury is healing, look how good he looked today when he left for his luncheon. All is well. No change of direction needed.
So simple. And yet it took taking a Me Day to be quiet enough to ask the right questions and listen to the answers.
I don’t take Me Days often enough. In a busy life, it’s hard to justify the time. I realize that’s not healthy thinking. Healthy thinking acknowledges how important it is to take care of myself, even when taking care doesn’t have a direct action like getting a massage, meeting a friend, going to therapy. Taking care can simply mean being alone long enough to figure out what you most need.
I have been busy. In the last six months I have been the caregiver to my husband as he recovers from a spiral fracture of his femur, I have navigated some rough months with our special needs daughter and her team, I have created and recorded six episodes of my new podcast, and along with my regular work at Unsinkable and a couple other boards, I have supervised the renovation of New Zealand house, and I have welcomed a new puppy Jimmy Buffett into our home. None of these things alone are overwhelming, most have been joyful in their own way. It’s just been a lot.
Today I am deeply grateful I took a Me Day and I encourage you all to find a little bit of space in your life for Me Time, if not for a day, a few hours.
Be well,
Silken