Almost 13 years ago, I moved to fairly rural Mississippi. It has been an education, and as Robert Khayat expressed it, the education of a lifetime. Things happen and things change. Sometimes we make them happen and sometimes they just happen to us, but it all results in change. Of course, since the world is a system of many systems, that also means it often happens in phases and stages and circles and cycles, which is how Willie Nelson puts it.
I have been on the road more days and hours than not in the past several days. One thing I do especially when I am traveling alone is use the time to sort out things. Lately, I have been sorting out what is time to let go of and in which direction I need to be traveling. I have important work to do, and it is easy to distract oneself from that work with things that begin to drain your energy, your focus, and definitely your time. Let's face it: there are only 24 hours in a day, so all we can do is manage the use of the time we have.
If we do not, then things tend to pile up, and the higher the pile, the more difficult it is to sort it out. That is not earth shattering news to anyone, but it does not make it any less true. If we want to sort out the pile, however, we need to at least have an idea where it is we want to be when done.
5 comments:
I've found that the distractions of life are like cobwebs in a closed up house. Once you sweep them out, then you can tidy up. And, I agree about road trips helping sort things out - if nothing else there is a clearing of the mind that usually leads to clarity.
Road Trip! Let's go. Seriously, alone time is essential for me. I feel for those who never learned to be alone with themselves, and enjoy being alone with themselves. I know where this is leading for me, but sometimes, I am loathe to put it out to the universe in words. Have you been there?
I treasure my solitude. I treasure my friendships, too, but it is my own little world that I really want to come home to after the day is over. I feel that in the aloneness I ground myself. I have to wonder if those who dislike being alone are really just avoiding facing their inner self.
From my experience, yes, they are. I love the phrase "rooted and grounded" although I do not recall its origins. Personally, I think both are essential. We need to be able to be with people, and we need to be able to be alone with ourselves. I think it comes developmentally from learning at an early age to soothe one's self, and also to lean on others. It is that whole balance thing. While we may lean to one side or the other, we still recognize the importance of both and all the in betweens.
A lot of people can't imagine living 40 minutes from work, but I grew up with my parents driving 30 minutes to work so I don't think about it as being strange. There are days that I wish I lived a little closer to work but there are days it's a blessing I have that time to gather my thoughts and decompress after a really stressful day. I listen to music and podcasts and me and Allie sing Disney songs on a kids station on Pandora. But what I really like are those little moments of time when I'm alone and quiet - completely by myself. That's when I really sort myself out and recharge my battery.
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