Day 206/366 days Towards Self-Mastery.
There is such a dearth of free time and privacy in the lives of women in our western society. Have you ever considered the cause and effect of what Sarah calls, "Privacy Deprivation Syndrome"?
How often do you find yourself unwell or even in some cases, as I found myself at one time, looking forward to the next time I fell ill to have time to sleep and rest my body. Not good.
In my group exploring radically real conversations recently, we touched on the effects of being distanced from family, either physically or emotionally, and how we compensate for that in our lives with work and business and children. We really do need to rethink the whole concept of family.
We hold it together at work and relax into our meltdowns at home. It's not uncommon for our family to bear the brunt of our exhaustion and lack of healing and renewing time to ourselves.
It's essential to carve out this time in your day/week.
And if you're a person who has a lot of free time as I am nowadays, it's time to consider how you can be family to others. At present this is something I'm exploring.
With a number of friends in need, and struggling along on their own, I'm considering how to be an aunty or a grandma to the family, an extra pair of hands when I visit, an extra set of eyes on the children.
It does mean developing a relationship with the family and not just with my friend. This way I hope to become a trusted person to them, and therefore welcomed to lend a helping hand.
Of course there are all the hurdles of overcoming the distrust that we have for strangers coming into our families, and that trust takes time. I'm prepared to give it time.
When my friends are struggling with depression or worse, I want to step up, to reach out, to be there and to be family. I'm on that mission this morning with a dear friend.
Rethinking family seems to mean coming together in support for others in our close circles. It doesn't mean rescuing. In my mind it means being present to provide space for my friend to find time to breathe, to be able to make a cuppa for herself, take a long bath, relax her diligence with her young children, to be able to see the wood for the trees for a brief time of my visit. And it will take as long as it takes. I'm not looking for her to make any progress over any given amount of time, other than to surrender to my visits.
It's a new experience for me also. I'm learning how to be family to others. I've got a starting place. I'm prepared to allow it to evolve.
366 days Towards Self-Mastery
When I considered my New Year's intentions for 2020 I had just one: To allow my heart to love what it loved...and let it lead me. (If not now, then when?)
I've spent months working on integrating my life. To live life more fully with my home life, my interests, my work, my responsibilities, all coming together, all connected. I want to give each the attention that they desire and need, and still have time and energy for the others. That means living and working from the heart.
As I was clearing out my bookshelf over the Christmas break I discovered Simple Abundance. I set it aside to explore it on New Year's Day as I lazed through another delicious day of nothingness. Sarah, the author, says this book is about living in grace. Living in grace I realised, is about Self-Mastery.
My thirst for understanding the human condition has driven me all my life, and hand-in-hand with self-mastery it has been a life-long goal. And seeing as I love to write, that living in grace is about self-mastery, and I love a bit of a challenge, then if I am truly going to let my heart lead, I really don't have any other choice. So scary as it feels, I'm starting out on a daily mission of leaning into the suggestions of this daybook and making a daily post to keep me accountable. If not now, then when?
I'm Josie. You can find out a little more about me here.
Simple Abundance: A Daybook of Comfort and Joy: by Sarah Ban Breathnach.
This book is written for the Australian and NZ market because it refers to seasonal changes. It's available on Amazon here if you'd like to follow along.