Clear the stage to move the needle on your life
Doing Less - to do what counts when you have chronic symptoms (or want to prevent them)
(Photo from Unsplash)
A late Happy New Year to you all, 2022 HAS ARRIVED. Perhaps you're still arriving, or perhaps it's old news! Just like Christmas, A New Year can feel overwhelming. A flood of emails and freebies from wherever you’re signed up to.
The collective pressure to overhaul and take on everything at once (there’s a lot to choose from and maybe your plate is already full or overflowing).
The clean slate of a year in front of you can feel overwhelming with those inner voices pushing you to 'get this year right'.
Perhaps you’re faced with the difficult realisation that you (and your life) are not where you would like them to be.. and you have no idea how to get them there.
This time of year, especially in the social media era, can feel confronting, It can bring much self-comparison, self-aversion and overwhelm. Sadly these never get us where we want to go.
Can you be patient with yourself and acknowledge that it’s been difficult?
Can you acknowledge the challenges of your illness or symptoms that make things harder?
Paradoxically if we can create some space for kindness and self-care by simplifying and streamlining our lives..
By being more discerning about our focus..
By making one or two changes at a time rather than feeling the pressure to do it all at once..
By saying no or stepping back from some things
Then perhaps we can come into balance and see our lives progress in positive directions. Meaningful change doesn’t always occur by adding more .. when we are already overloaded. It can come by slowing down and doing less so we can do more of what really counts.
Things that really move the needle on the gauge of our life (think: old-fashioned kitchen scale!)
This 1 min video clip explains it beautifully.
How to Heal | Brother Phap Linh
So this is my intention and hope.
I’m ignoring my inner pushy voice, resisting my tendency to fill up all my time, breathing through the feeling that I should have it all figured out, mapped out and be raring to go.
Instead I’m starting slow and grounded, seeing what I can clear off my plate (or not put back on it!).
Giving myself time to anchor in some daily practices that always make the biggest difference. These are in fact the very things I teach: meditation, yoga and reflection.
Are there one or two things that align with your core values that you know would ripple out into everything else in your life? Can you clear the stage for them and see what unfolds?
Here’s a clue, These are normally the things that help you return to yourself or to feel like yourself. Doing this might just be the foundation that we all need for a wonderful 2022 to unfold.
Clearing
by Martha Postlethwaite
Do not try to save
the whole world
or do anything grandiose.
Instead, create
a clearing
in the dense forest
of your life
and wait there
patiently,
until the song
that is your life
falls into your own cupped hands
and you recognize and greet it.
Only then will you know
how to give yourself
to this world
so worth of rescue.
“You are worth the quiet moment. You are worth the deeper breath. You are worth the time it takes to slow down, be still and rest.”
— MHN