Reve' Revival

I do this thing in the yoga classes I teach, where I ask the students to pause between the two sides. We give space for whatever just happened on that one side to land and be felt, to notice the difference between the two sides. To direct our attention into that specific place and notice what we feel before moving on to repeat the same on the other side. Sometimes it can be quite subtle and seems like a time waster to the ever moving and grooving mind, but other times, the difference is so great that I joke we’ll just end it there and call it a night having taken the time to notice one leg feeling 3 inches longer than the other!

The brings me back to the idea of contemplation. We’re an ambitious group of peoples and that’s a very cool and innovative thing, but without allowing time to land and giving space between the things, between the doings, it can all feel rather flat, soul-less. Like a tire spinning on slick ice, never quite getting a firm grasp or catch of it, just spinning out again and again, with zero traction. The more we go and “spin”, the more that sensation of fulfillment can elude us and thus the harder we try, the more doing we do. It’s an interesting and exhaustively futile cycle.

I’m in an especially ambitious and creative time in my life. With it being summer here now, my kids are gone most of it, spending their summers mostly with their Dad. With all the extra time to myself and uninterrupted thought, ideas can come through much easier and quicker. I’m able to move on things much faster than I normally would be able to when tending to other’s needs and I take full advantage of it. I’m knocking out an entire month’s worth of work in a single morning, all before 9am! But what I’ve found with this, (besides the boost of confidence and trust in self that I can get shit done when I get focused and need to!) is that without allowing time for it all to land, none of it feels truly soul satisfying. Ego gratifying? For sure. But then it’s quickly on to the next thing.

So this morning, I simply sat and let. Let it all land, like snowflakes in a snow globe. I took out my journal and begin writing gratitude lists. ‘Thank you for this time, for these sweet cats with soft fur, for these green trees and plants that delight my eyes and soothe my soul, for oxygen, a/c, fresh water….’ simple. The more I wrote, the more my heart swelled, like filling up a glass of water to the brim until it begins to spill over the sides. I felt so completely content and full. More so than any of the “doings” I had gotten done. And you may ask, Rhiannon, but what did you actually accomplish and get done?

Connection. Love.

What else is there? What else is really the point of it all? Without this, we will always be spinning our wheels, seeking that feeling, but never quite sinking our teeth into any of it. From stillness, we discover it’s already here. It’s a bubbling up from within, not without. A realization that has always been, always will be, always available to us, if we choose to open our palms and land in what’s here, right now.