pretty please

At the new moon I whisper a promise to myself: more self-kindness. And it isn’t that I’m unkind to myself, it’s just that things sometimes pile up and I keep reaching my arms out and out and out, forgetting to wrap them around myself, too. And so this whisper, this promise, more self-kindness, appears on my page. Pretty please.

I buy myself tulips just because. It’s been so long since I’ve bought myself flowers just because. There’s no hesitation in choosing the color, my eye my hand my heart reaching for pink pink pink. I don’t reach for pink because it’s my favorite color (it’s not); I reach for pink just because.

A dab of red paint swirled with a dab of blue paint yields violet; add some white paint, a touch more red, and voila, pink. A tint on the color wheel, its own color, its own thing, solid and true.

I take salt baths, adding drops of essential oil, lighting candles, reading, listening to meditations, taking care (if I’m honest) of a few emails, listening to music, the water growing tepid before I truly relax. More self-kindness, pretty please; next time: water, Epsom salts, essential oil, nothing else.

I’m getting better at taking breaks instead of pushing through. When I could dust and vacuum both upstairs and downstairs in one fell swoop, I choose only upstairs, save the downstairs for tomorrow. When I could push for more words, I get up from my desk and take the pup for a walk. When I could add more yoga classes to my teaching schedule, I graciously decline. When I could do a million other things, I lie down on the floor and put my feet on the ottoman. I’m getting better at taking breaks, am getting better at self-kindness.

I tell a friend that I need white space, buffer, cushion, less. In an effort to grow consciously as a loving and kind human, I read and reflect and seek community. And also. In an effort to grow consciously as a loving and kind human, I stare out the window, tune into sensation, take walks by myself.

Life is ever a balance, not balance as in finding a perfect middle spot where there is no teetering (there is always some teetering), but rather leaning into the up and down, a dab of this and a dab of that, tinting, mixing, resting in the middle(ish), holding steady(ish), at least for a time(ish). Catching breath, redirecting, buffering.

More self-kindness, turning in and in and in, wrapping arms around self, mixing in touches of kindness so that then, from this place of nourishment, we may pull our brushes across a greater canvas, out and out and out, a masterpiece saturated, solid, and true. Because. Pretty please.