Stretched thin. Wishing you could do more. Wishing there was less to do. Wondering if you will ever accomplish all the things you want to do. Wondering if you will ever feel like you are doing enough despite doing so much…
We have real limits in terms of our individual energy and in the number of hours in a day. As a chronic “over-doer,” I have been practicing trying to do less for a long time now. And it has helped in many ways.
But new and surprising questions came into my heart in more recent times: “Where do I need to do more? What needs more of my capacity that I have been neglecting?”
I resisted these questions at first thinking I was just falling into old patterns. I couldn’t possibly be entertaining a question about doing more! The question persisted, though, and so I had to explore it.
I learned that I needed to “do” more of the things of “being” - of staring at the birds flying in the sky, of listening to the cricket song at night, watching my cat sleep, closing my eyes to really hear that song, sipping tea on the front porch, stopping to lean against a tree mid-hike...
As I shift more of my capacity here, focus finds me, and oddly, I feel more space open up with that focus. There is space for my creative imagination to work its magic, space for seeing what is truly in my heart to create in the world, space for slowness and trust to regain their rightful place at the helm.
When I think of some of my favorite writers and artists, the ones that grip me are the ones that speak of slowing down, of noticing, of showing the world what its missing in all of its busy-ness.
I think of Mary Oliver’s grasshopper, Georgia O’Keeffe’s flowers, Fredrick Franck’s seeing/zen practice. And I remember why I create.
And feel re-inspired and compelled to create once more, with an even stronger conviction to carve out what time those creations need.
What kind of “being” do you need to “do” today? What needs more of your capacity?
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