On Comfort and Learning What We Need

Sometimes in the doing, a certain rushing creeps in.  It’s not intended (the rushing) and maybe we think we’re doing fine (and maybe we are) but, sometimes, there comes a point when we pause and we wonder just how the crazy managed to creep in.

I found myself at that point the other day.  Well, truthfully, I keep finding myself at that point. I’m not exactly feeling crazy.  I’m not exactly feeling overwhelm.  I’m not exactly feeling anxious.  It’s simply more a sense of stop! wait! what the hell?  Truthfully, it’s a noticing…a noticing that somewhere in the course of my day I went from moving with ease to moving with something heavy hanging over me.  And you know what?  I don’t really like it.

I know some of it is new rhythms that come with this time of year.  New schoolwork, new activities, new faces, new places to be at new times and I better check my planner one more time to make sure I’m getting the kids to the right place at the right time.  I’m enjoying plenty of quiet mornings (thank goodness, because they help set the tone for the rest of my day).  But, still, I’m losing myself somewhere in there.  And so?

And so I try again the next day.  I sip my coffee and, as I pour myself a second cup, I remind myself that I really and truly do have ten minutes to sit on the front porch.  I take my coffee and Mary Oliver with me.  And I sit and sip and savor.

Yesterday, these words from Mary Oliver’s , “In Our Woods, Sometimes a Rare Music” touched me:

Not enough is a poor life.
But too much is, well, too much.
Imagine Verdi or Mahler
everyday, all day.
It would exhaust anyone.

As I work through class with my current students, I remind them (as much as I remind myself) that there are comforts we can offer ourselves that support us as we move through our day.  I know this and believe this deeply.  And yet, I still sometimes forget.  I invite others to do it while forgetting it for myself.  Not all the time, but sometimes.  Lately, maybe I’ve been forgetting.

Richard Bach said, “We teach best what we most need to learn”.  And so?
And so I teach; I learn.  I step onto the porch and sit on the rocker.

sending a little love your way, m

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