I’m finding it fascinating how people fight, flight, or freeze, in times of uncertainty. I tend to flip from one to another hour by hour. But it always circles around the question of what can I do? Am I doing enough? Who am I to do anything? Kinda heavy and sometimes self-loathing. Which typically charges me up into fight – into go mode, and off onto a new idea. Then I quickly lose the juice and freeze from fear, which brings me back to where I should always begin- by asking “in this moment, what do I need?” Then when I’m filled up and ready…
What can I offer? What are my special gifts or resources? I create sacred spaces. And now more than ever I think we need this space to ask our self this same question before we run around that wheel of fight flight or freeze. In this moment, what do I need? Embracing this new, ever changing normal, and giving myself grace to accept this gift of time; deciding what I am and am not in control of; trusting, and letting go. This for me is more difficult than I’d like to admit. And then again equally, giving myself grace to return to my need for a semblance of control, to bring peace of mind. Even if it looks like organizing the Tupperware or pretending I’m a 4thgrade teacher. Teachers, let me tell you, I have a much bigger appreciation for. But in times of uncertainty I think it’s OK to withdraw from the big picture overwhelm and retreat in Tupperware organizing 1O1. To stop and take in the present moment. So I did.
I’m a designer and even though I feel this is not the top of most peoples focus, creating my own sacred space brings me presence and allows me a tangible outlet when I feel the chaos closing in. So today I took 5 minutes. In my office I printed, framed and hung in plain view, a reminder of what I am in control of, which is simply how I show up.
These four agreements remind me that everyone is on their own course with what-is presently. And what I know to be true, is that on a global scale this uncertainty is surfacing traumas, feelings, ideas, and ways of thought that are mucky and weighted, and probably for a lot of us, were buried for a good reason. For me, it brings up scarcity. Scarcity of money, scarcity of food, and believe it or not scarcity of time. It’s my big one. Like the biggest…over food?! But time looks a little different now than it did just a week ago, when I was rushing here and there, saying yes to things I wanted to say no to, and no to things I wanted to say hell yes to. And today this idea of scarcity of time sounds more like… What do I really want to do? What do I have to offer and why am I not doing it now? Kinda simple, and yet so very not. So for now, I will simply focus on how I show up and not what I do, and come back to asking myself and my family “in this present moment what do we need?” …and it might be to organize the Tupperware. So it is.
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be impeccable withyour word. take nothing personally. make no assumptions. always do your best.
-Don Miguel Ruiz |
