It seems I can sustain a new habit for exactly one day.
That's not really true, of course, and I'm chuckling as I write this, and think it. My experience yesterday morning must have been meant to give me a window into what is possible. My experience today reminds me I have to set up these changes well.
I woke early this morning - 12:45 after turning off the light at ten last night. Then again sometime just before two or three, and another time at a time I can't remember. Finally, again at about six this morning. I need to remember to be more specific with my intentions. I want to get up early, but not so early or so often in a single night.
Fortunately, I'm still laughing. Sense of humor is everything.
I'm also reminded that everything is not about producing. Or accomplishing. Today the outdoors beckon. Birdsong reminds me that I haven't been outside in awhile, probably since I came home from spending time with my daughter a few weeks ago, except of course to get the mail, to get in the car, or out of the car and into the house, for Sunday worship.
A thought seeps in at the edge of my thinking. It's a great day to drive down to the beach.
The Jersey Shore is either an hour or an hour and a half drive, depending on which road I take, which shore town I want to visit. It's crazy that just that short drive can get me to the ocean. One of my life goals (that lives in the back of my mind, not the front of my mind) is to live near the ocean. Not sure how I made that happen, but there it is. Sometimes I wonder what might happen if that goal was in the front of my mind.
Anyway, days like today remind me there are many choices in life. What do we do with our free days? How do we spend them? They're not like money that sits in an account, waiting for us. They're more like money that sits on a table and turns to dust if not spent before bedtime.
It's a sobering thought and an exciting thought.
How shall I spend a free afternoon today? Call my son and see if he's free? Pop into town and walk around the Rodin Museum's outdoor exhibition space? Drive down the shore and look at the ocean and maybe take a book and catch up on some pleasure reading? Put on my hiking shoes and walk into the woods? Call a friend and see if she's free for dinner?
Putting the thoughts on paper, so to speak, gets them out of my head and before my eyes and back into my head differently. It's the beginning of manifestation since they're no longer just in my head and are out in the world in some way.
It also gets me to think more expansively - I could also hop on a train and go into Manhattan for the first time since before the pandemic. I think the last time I may have been there was November or December 2019. I could drive northwest to the mountains and spend the day walking in the woods there. Or a two hour drive could get me to the Catskills. As I think about it, there are a lot of interesting places I can get to for a day trip or an easy overnight if I want to stretch out the fun and adventure.
I feel like my mind is stretching after a long sleep, and it could be that that's what these pandemic restrictions have been - a long sleep for our desire. I continue to step carefully with my own practices, but it's time for me to start dreaming again, and to start stepping gently beyond restriction.
A Hundred Days of Happiness is a daily writing practice that opens a landscape of discovery into my own human experience.
Katherine Cartwright has been blogging since 2012, and each year brings new wonder. She asks big questions of the small things in life.
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