Self-care In Order To Be Self-less

Do you constantly find yourself with very little time for taking care of yourself?  Do you always put others ahead of yourself?  When was the last time  you took time for yourself?

If you find yourself grasping for an answer to the final question, you are not alone.  Many of us do our absolute best to be self-less and generous with our time and resources.  We strive to make the lives of those we love easier and smoother.  We try to anticipate their needs and provide whatever we possibly can to enhance the quality of their lives.  Our desire is to do everything we possibly can to provide for those we love, or for those we see are in need of help.

In doing so, we very often leave ourselves dragging behind.  We tend to use all of our available resources and energy on the act of providing and helping.  When we reach the end of the day there is simply not much energy, time or resources to fulfill our needs, or to even stop and recognize what those needs might be.

There is an old saying that you cannot give from an empty well.  Oftentimes it take a crisis of some sort to wake us up to the necessity of self-care.  Sometimes it is a health scare.  Sometimes it is a loved one calling you out on your self-neglect.  Whatever the trigger is for us to recognize the need to be a bit more selfish with our own care, it is still not easy to act on.  We are habitual providers, having forgotten that we should be the recipient of that glorious giving as well.  If we go too long neglecting our self-care needs we will not have enough resources or stamina to provide for those we love and care about. 

Self-care does not have to be expensive, or resource intensive, but it has to occur.  Some simple ways to start a self-care practice are to carve out some time for yourself each day.  It does not have to be a lot of time.  It could be 10 minutes a day to start.  That time is yours to do whatever makes you feel alive and healthy.  You might take that time to write in a gratitude journal.  You might sit on the bathroom mat with a face-mask on.  A steaming cup of tea might be your joy during that time.  You see, the thing you do for yourself in that "you time" is meant to be particular to what brings you joy.  Everyone will do something different with their time and that is why it is special. 

That short "you time" is just a start....you can grow your self-care practice from there.  Adding in a walk outside on sunny days (or in the rain if you like) or reading scripture or prayer.  Simple daily routines are what will fill up your well.  The consistency is the key to self-care that becomes non-negotiable and does not feel like an extravagant splurge.  Yes, those are good too, but their joy is temporary.  We want to stay healthy, joyful and strong enough to care for others.  So please consider investing time in yourself, being compassionate with your needs and not feeling selfish, but self-cared for.

Namaste',

Michelle

Slumbering Dreams

How do I heal the ache inside of me?  How do I transform the black hole of emptiness where love and dreams used to co-exist into a fully functioning and healthy heart again?  Is that hole where my passions and dreams used to exist?  Or is it where I used to hold onto the love I received, storing it with my dreams for darker days? So that I could tap into that reserve whenever I might feel lonely or lost.  I want so badly to believe it is just a temporary situation and that my dreams and desires are simply being held so tightly, protected from any current reality, that they will emerge like carbon under pressure to shine brilliantly and show a quality of resilience unlike any other dreams before them. 

My dreams cannot be dead.  They must be just in a deep slumber, waiting to be awakened.  Once awakened, they will shine brightly and be a beacon for others in search of rekindling their own dreams.  You see, dreams don’t really die; they just go unnourished, unable to survive without care and intentional nurturing.  For you must love your dreams as you do yourself, as they were born of you, spawn of your deepest desires.

As our dreams are slowly being prodded awake from their long hibernation, we need to ask if they still resemble our dreams of long ago, or have they aged and matured while we ignored them and let them lay fallow?  With fresh, but tired, eyes we look at these dusty dreams to try them on once again.  Do they still fit, or have years of neglect made them saggy and shape-less?  Are they too small for us now?  Have we matured into a more awakened state only to realize that our dreams were constricting or were dependent upon someone else?  If we are truly to be happy we need to scour those dreams in search of any kernels of a vision that still resonate in our hearts today.  We need to morph those dreams into ones that are pertinent to whom we are now.  We need to infuse them with the wisdom from our many life experiences.  We need to extract out the parts that don’t align anymore and smooth out the rough edges so that we can not only see our dreams clearly, but that we may feel our way to them without the pain of sharp fragments left by components ripped out.  We must facilitate our dreams compassionately.

Show them love and light so that they may benefit others.

Much Metta to All Dreamers,

Michelle

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Love Letter to the Newly Awakened

 Dear Loving Ones,

This is for the ones walking through their days with broken hearts, those who have found themselves carrying deep sadness, anger, malaise, or just general disbelief and shock.  Whether that heartbreak has been caused by loss of a loved one, a fractured relationship or from the plethora of current events plaguing our world, it is heartbreak nonetheless and it is real.  Your heart may ache with an ever-present nagging of discomfort or even with distinct pain.  Neither should be discounted as insignificant.  This heartbreak is an opportunity for going inward and assessing what is needed to move ahead to enable a life of peaceful moments.

Experiencing heartbreak is like being newly awakened.  It tears away the shroud of safety that we have become so adept at placing around ourselves.  It awakens us to the comings and goings of the universe around us.  It enables us to remember how important it is to love others, as well as care for ourselves.  It’s as if we begin to notice others who are feeling the same way, and are more open to connecting with them in a quest to mend ourselves, as well as heal society around us.  As I hear news almost every day about loss of life due to violence and hatred, it is often very tempting to allow myself to sink back into the hole of heartache.  But allowing myself to disappear into that abyss of pain only discourages my love from being shared with others. 

If you find yourself angry, sad, frightened, disillusioned or grieving, you are one of the newly awakened. 

We all have a light to shine and my wish for all the newly awakened is that we can feel our way past our heartbreak and use it as a way to connect and spread peace. 

Much Love and Metta,

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Michelle

I have missed you all....

My words.

Try as I might, I am unable to sit still long enough to let the words pour out of my fingertips into text.  The words, and the thoughts that cause them to rise up, are coming fast and furious...too fast for my fingers to respond. Yet when I try to slow them enough to allow them to flow into a state of visibility, they seem illusive and hesitant. 

I wonder aloud if they are just too sensitive, or shy, to be written, as if they perhaps don’t want to be captured and memorialized.  But then I suppose that could not be the case, since they return often and flow so easily in dialogue.  The words are comfortably there in conversations with my spouse and with my good friends.  They are honest and heartfelt.  They are intended for truth telling and soul-healing for both others and myself.

Then I realize that my thoughts, and ensuing words, are really just being selectively introverted and only coming out in the presence of people they know and trust.  They present themselves in dialogue even with people who have caused pain.  It seems that my words have no problem at all sitting with others, but are skeptical of the safety of full disclosure to those that they might not know.  Once written, the words lose sight of the audience, forever having lost control of the message. 

I remind them that once released in dialogue, they have been discovered and pulled from hiding already.  Therefore I will write.

Namaste' - Michelle