Study in Stillness

I remember my ex telling me once about a woman he knew who got more done by ten in the morning than most people get done all day.

It's a story that's always stayed with me.

There's something alluring about the idea of getting done what really needs to be done by mid-morning and having the rest of the day to do other things. I imagine it being a life with less stress than the one I have created. And I imagine creating that kind of life, and how I might feel if I'm able to pull it off.

From a distance, something like this sounds impossible. But on a day like today I can see it. 

I woke up this morning at 4:45. The birds were singing more loudly than the air conditioner was humming. I actually felt somewhat rested, and I didn't have a headache. Morning headaches can rob me of hours as I try to manage them. I was up by 5:30 - I decided that I would not fall back to sleep and I remembered how much I like the quiet of the early morning. It reminds me a little of Wendell Berry's poem The Peace of Wild Things. Before human industry begins, the natural world is all there is. My kitchen has walls of windows and I often feel like I live in a treehouse here. It is all sky and sunrise and tree canopy and breeze moving everything this morning.

I finished up some dishes and had some lemon water, made tea and pulled out my morning journal. Did that writing and pulled out the new journal I began yesterday morning. Realized I'd forgotten the night writing and did that before heading into the morning prompts. Pulled out my laptop and began this writing. As I did that, I remembered this story. It's a 33 year-old-story, but somehow it's still with me. 

On my writing table in my library I have a 3 by 5 index card that says,

Schedule what's most important first. Always.

I think about this as I reflect on what fills my early morning time. What I think about when I think about what I'd like to get done by mid-morning. It's always the writing. Of course, I'd like also to get in some yoga and meditation, maybe a walk, especially in the summer when it can get hot and muggy here. Walks later in the day are not as enjoyable. Maybe also some focused de-cluttering or home organization time. 

Perhaps it's also the freedom to be still and notice things I'd otherwise miss. Like the pair of mourning doves high up on the weeping cherry in my neighbor's yard. I notice them as I take a minute to pause in the writing and look out the window. They are silhouetted against grey cloud. My cheek resting on my hand, my elbow resting on the table, I am still and not worried about a thing. The clouds break and there's blue sky. Light tips the puffy, white clouds that have transformed from grey. Soft, white early-morning light spreads as the clouds disperse. Farther off, birds fly across the skies. The doves remain, a study in stillness and in the peace of wild things.

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.