There is Always Enough Time
I don’t have time to write this post, or so one of the voices in my head tells me. You likely have a similar voice, with a similar refrain—no time, no time, no time.
What would your life be like without this belief? What would today be like if this was your refrain: I have all the time I need?
I’ve been trying on different voices lately—different refrains. I’ve been noticing that whatever I believe about the abundance or scarcity of time seems to come true. This morning, I was mentally running the length of my unreasonably long to-do list when suddenly I realized that the one thing I really needed to do was plop down on the couch and pet my dog. So I did. He rested his head on my legs and tilted his chin up for me to stroke his neck. The sun streamed through the maple leaves outside my window, and the rigid heaviness of The List softened into doodle fur and dappled light. Half of the boxes on my list immediately checked themselves because in that slowing down and centering, I realized that they could wait. That they just weren’t all that important. The urgency and scarcity revving up my nervous system were fictions of my own mind—byproducts of my unexamined beliefs.
Now here I am going rogue, waltzing off-list, writing this post that I imagined I had no time to write. Here’s what I feel: calm, a sense of abundance, space opening up around me.
Are there beliefs that stand in the way of your feeling this today?
If so, here are a handful of refrains that you can try on. These are the things I’ve been telling myself, in my more centered moments (which, in case you’re wondering, do not constitute all of my moments):
You have all the time you need.
There is enough time for all the things that are actually yours to do.
Slow down. Everything you need is right here.
There’s always enough time for a deep breath.
There’s always enough time to watch the clouds roll past.
Let this take the time that it takes.
I wish you an inner landscape of abundance today! May you (and I) settle into the enoughness of this moment right now, may we take things as they come, may we give the gifts of our time and attention with mindfulness and care, may we breathe deeply, and may we find space opening within and around us.
Really needed this today!
"I’ve been trying on different voices lately—different refrains." Me too, Lisa, me too! I once had a therapist who told me that it was easier to be negative, because the brain registers negativity quicker than positivity. Being positive and happy takes more mindful direction, and that's something I've been making a priority of mine. When my default is to lean into the negatives of a situation, I am trying to reframe my thoughts to be positive. It absolutely makes a difference. Perspective is everything! When you wrote, "The urgency and scarcity revving up my nervous system were fictions of my own mind—byproducts of my unexamined beliefs," that resonated with me on a deep level. There's always a list of things I should be doing, but what about the things we WANT to be doing? What is actually necessary? Maybe that comes down to perspective, too.