The Ebb and the Flow and Your Ability to Choose
This past Monday morning, I had a sick kiddo and no babysitter so I decided to stay home for the day. Last week was a busy week and we had a busy weekend, so I was really looking forward to hanging out at home and getting some work done from my dining table instead of the office. I got up, got my oldest on the bus, and enjoyed a looooooong cup of coffee in the sunshine. In my world, coffee and sunshine leads to inspiration. I was feeling excited for my day- Mondays are always my favourite! While I finished up my coffee I was doing some heavy duty Instagram stalking of some of my fave biz ladies. Today for some reason I was really curious about their journeys, so I scrolled down to the verrrrrrrrry beginning of their IG accounts to start from the beginning. It was kind of funny. You see these people and these brands and assume they have their shit together. Looking back into time was a reminder to me that everyone is on a journey. Everyone started somewhere. Everyone has put the time in to wake up each day and try to be better than yesterday: to learn more, to do more, to BE more.
I needed this reminder today. My feelings of imperfection and inadequacy can paralyze me. My “word” for 2017 is ACTION- not as in hard-core aggressive action, but as in one foot in front of the other one step at a time action. My goal for 2017 is to keep moving forward little by little instead of allowing myself to stay stuck in spaces of indecision and overwhelm.
Lately, I’ve been feeling a little scattered. It seems like there are so many things to be done and so many things I “should” be doing, that I’ve been having trouble actually focusing on any of them. Add in some life stress, and I’ve been feeling like I’m all over the map. I’ve been feeling less than productive and like I’m not even sure which direction I should be going in.
This morning in the sunshine, peering into the past of those I look up to, I realized a couple things. I realized I’ve been comparing my chapter one to many others’ chapter 20. Or even volume 2. I reminded myself their brands didn’t start out as shiny-perfect as they look now. It took time and it took ACTION. It took waking up each day and putting ONE FOOT IN FRONT OF THE OTHER. It took trying new things and taking leaps of faith and navigating through failures.
I also realized that I know what it takes to nourish my creativity and inspiration, but I haven’t been doing it. I haven’t been taking time to sit in the sun with my coffee and I haven’t been taking time to retreat from life to allow the things I know to rise to the surface. I haven’t been taking time or creating opportunities for myself to have real silence or real soul-time. I’ve been pushing and striving a little too much and focusing a little too much on the “shoulds”.
You see there’s a fine balance in the world of soulful creation. Action is necessary to move forward; however, in order to be able to TAKE ACTION, there needs to be the times of quiet introspection. There need to be long coffee breaks and sunshine and rest. There need to be pauses and space and time to just BE in order to KNOW what action to take and to have the energy to do what needs to be done. It’s an age-old truth; there must be the EBB and the FLOW and the rise before the swell. One cannot exist without the other, and such is the push and pull of life. We can get wrapped up in pushing and pushing and pushing in life, but we soon realize we are getting nowhere. Similarly, we can get so wrapped up in the “what ifs” and “shoulds” that we lose sight of where we were even going to begin with.
These analogies apply to life in general. Do you ever feel like you’re just “doing” life, but not really living it and that you are certainly not in control of it? Do you ever feel like you’re spinning on a hamster wheel and there is never an end in sight?
Today I challenge you to step back and take a look at your life from the outside. Are you trapped on the hamster wheel running and running but having no idea what you’re even running for? Or are you so scared of what might lie ahead that you’re frozen exactly where you are and you just don’t know how to take that first step forward? And then, what are you going to do about it? Are you going to say no to just one more trip to town this week? Are you going to politely decline the dinner plans on Friday night so you can just be still for a few hours? Or are you going to choose just one thing to do today to propel yourself forward, even if it’s just pouring that extra glass of water or making that appointment you’ve been dreading?
Life, my loves, is for living. It is not about achieving perfection and it is certainly not about staying stagnant just to avoid the risks of the unknown. It is for LIVING. And the most beautiful thing is that you get to choose what that reality looks like. Deep down, you know what you have to do, so join me today in committing to yourself that you’re going to take what you need in order to do what you need to do.
With so much love,
Elsa