Water Flowing Through My Closed Palms

A 30 minute stream of consciousness.

Image: A capture from my recent trip to Deer Park Monastery.

I just set a timer - 30 minutes. It’s all I have but I want to write. This is the first time I have sat down to write, outside of my journal, in 2 months. How does time pass so fast? I remember, during the pandemic, a day felt like a week -  an hour, a day. Now, daytime hours slip through my consciousness like water flowing through my closed palms. Gone.

Nighttime hours crawl, though - like thick manuka honey slipping off a spoon. A haze of bodily fluids, most often not my own. Recently, I asked my acupuncturists which TCM herbs would most benefit me. She lovingly let me know that there was not a single herb that would make up for a lack of restorative sleep.

Sleep is not the only thing that has kept me from writing, as of late. As I shared at the beginning of the year, I recently weaned my son from breastfeeding. The weaning process went smoothly - thankfully. I am grateful to share that my physical body has greatly benefitted from the extra energy I am no longer using to create milk. Many days, when I have space for myself, I am choosing workouts that I was not able to access during my lactation era. It feels good to harness my physical power again, in a different way. Creating and sustaining life was powerful, strong movements are powerful, too. Many rivers, one ocean.

As my minutes tick down, here are some unrelated thoughts that feel like coming through:

• At the beginning of the year, I made a few of the essays I wrote last year “subscriber only” (to read, one would need to be a DTS subscriber). When I made those shifts, I had planned that I would be writing at least monthly in the first half of 2024. (I need to be more mindful of what I commit to when I am bolstered by the energy of a few nights of good sleep and the uplifting hormones of my ovulatory phase.)

  As time ticked on and my writing did not, I frequently felt this pull to either take the “subscriber only” gate away or to share a post saying “I’m not writing a lot right now but I plan to write more when both of my kids are in camp this summer”.

  And then, I had a realization - all of my readers are adults. I am confident that you can make decisions that feel good for you and if those decisions no longer feel good, you can make a new one. If someone subscribes, and feels as if their contribution is not being reciprocated, they can cancel. No coddling on my part is necessary :) 

  In spite of my time limitation, I felt called to write today - I’m never going to sit down to write to simply keep up a monthly writing quota. I trust that if that resonates with you and you have the financial means, you’ll support. If it doesn’t, you won’t.

  Right now, I am deep in the practice of untethered writing. And by that, I mean writing without the tether of my perception of how and when a reader will receive it.

  How empowering? For both me, and for you.

• I started working with a new therapist 2 weeks ago. After Sloan was born, I actively worked with a therapist for 1.5 years. Her approach was unconventional and after a period of time, our relationship had run its healthy course. Over the last couple of years, I have tried to work with a couple of different therapists and no one clicked. I am so glad to say this current dynamic feels promising.

  The other day, I sat my computer on a chair in front of my couch - so I could get the full therapy experience, at home. 

  After a few minutes, our conversation landed on motherhood. As I spoke, tears began to sting my eyes - accessing tears is not something that comes easily to me... I told her, “I have sat on countless therapy couches and talked about topics way heavier - and more painful - than this, and for whatever reason, motherhood, all of its beauties and challenges, is by far my hardest life chapter.”

  We talked about why… 

  Loneliness is a topic that came through. Sometimes, I’m like what’s harder?: Spending an evening at home, alone with my kids… Or, trying to make plans with another mom who has kids the same age as mine. I can’t be the only one who struggles with this, right?

  I also shared about how tough it can be to have zero control over how much sleep I will receive. Recently, I went to bed early with the intention of getting a good night's sleep, only to spend most of the night awake, cleaning up vomit. Then a couple of hours later, an accident. That night, I had planned to go to sleep early, so I could wake up early and have time for my practices. I slept in that day, and ended up using my free time to catch up on dishes and soiled laundry.

  And we talked about how that - remaining present to day to day life - is my spiritual practice these days. In the past, my practices looked like morning pages and 45 minutes on my meditation cushion. Today, my practice is meeting what arrives with presence and an open mind and heart. And, today, my practice is having compassion with myself when I am human - when I fight the here and now.

  Recently, I have also uncovered the ways in which overachieving and perfectionism manifest in my mothering and the suffering created by those tendencies. More on that in the future…

  At the end of each session, my new therapist asks me what I am going to practice this week. And this week, my practice is to embrace messiness - as my spiritual practice. The messiness of trying to get out of the house with two small children and accepting it will hardly ever feel “easy”. The messiness of never knowing what’s going to come next and being open to what arrives. The messiness of the unhealed wounds that are revealed through fiercely loving my children (and your children and the children that I will never meet nor know)... The messiness of knowing I’m never going to get it “right” and that’s the point.

• Permanent and unconditional ceasefire. Immediate aide. End the occupation.

Spaces for Deeper Rumination:

• Can you identify ways that you are coddling others to avoid disappointing them?

• What are you practicing this week?

More Deep and Shallow Stuff: 

I am out of time so this will be short and sweet…

• On a recent episode of the We Can Do Hard Things podcast, Alanis Morissette spoke to wholeness versus wellness and that has been rolling around my brain for weeks.

• Personally, I loved One Day on Netflix.

• I am a Book of the Month subscriber (that is my referral link) and I was able to add Yours Truly to my March box for free. I went in with zero expectation and I LOVED IT. I am guessing this book’s audience is mostly female but I so wish men would read this book. Jacob, one of the main characters, was intimately aware of his shortcomings and had a handful of practices to help him cope with life and show up in meaningful ways. I laughed. I got teary-eyed. And I devoured it in 4 nights.

• Yesterday, I received my first Nuuly delivery. My personal style is evolving and I am so excited to explore new ways to visually express myself. I got an awesome jumpsuit, I’ll share a photo soon.