It’s that time again – a new year!
And though I’m the same person I was last year, with much of the same circumstances and problems as I had last year, I seem to be incapable of abandoning hope for new things and growth in the new year that lays stretched out before me.
I’m not generally too into “befores” and “afters” and hard concrete goals, but there’s just something about a new year.
Last year, I wrote about my tendency to find my thoughts centered around a word, or a purpose, which unfolds (usually somewhat organically) into practices and goals. It took a while last year, but I waited and trusted, and that focus eventually emerged.
Well cue 2022 doing it’s own thing: on January 1, this time it – the word “flow” – simply fell into my lap.
I reached out, curious as to what it might mean, almost tentatively touching it like a kitten. Petting it, to see how it felt. Would it scratch at me, bite me? Or would it maybe feel like the perfect little gift?
And almost instantly, I realized the word “flow” was about control. About examining my need for it. About knowing myself and my beliefs, but also letting go of the need of it. And engaging in things that might help me to be flexible, and lessen my own emotional angst.
Yup, you’ve got that right.
Emotional angst and I know each other well.
Blame it on the pandemic, blame it on decreased socialization, blame it on being forced to sit with the unknowns and my own fears doing harm … but yeah, we know each other well.
One big area in my life that seem to interact with rigidness and frustration is the ongoing pandemic.
Questions ruminate in my mind. When will we end up sick? Who will I lose? Will I get someone sick? When will things be more normal? Why do people refuse to do the right thing? What has to happen to make people take this seriously? When can I stop second guessing everything?
Another area in my life where any notion of flow seems so challenging is parenting.
I mean, there are times I’m relaxed and playful and just “on”, but who can always inhabit that space? Judgmental internal voices bounce around all the time, and though I try to check them, they say things like: Wow, you botched that interaction with S. Your kid hates you now. You scared them. Nice job being the “adult”, Laura. They’ll never listen to you if you’re not consistent. Get through to your kid, or he’s going to end up a criminal deviant. You’re gonna eff this up every damn day, girl.
These two spaces in my life truly feel at odds with “flow” and yet I know there’s a need to embrace what IS there because otherwise these spinning wheels of anxiety and frustration just build and build.
So what will it look like? How will it play out?
I’m not sure yet, but
- I find myself revisiting ideas about ACT (acceptance and commitment therapy), and asking “What does radical acceptance look like?” (And how do you radically accept people and/or ideas and/or behaviors that enrage you? Should that be the goal?)
- I find myself wondering about meditation. I think about getting over attached to my emotions and thoughts, and wonder what it would be like to watch them flow away from me, almost down a stream.
- I find myself thinking about the serenity prayer (“God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change; The courage to change the things I can; And the wisdom to know the difference.”)
- I find myself wondering about the physical tension I carry, the inflexibility that takes root in mind AND body.
- I think about dance and “yoga flows” and how I used to practice more, and how I’ve lost a lot of that physical balance and flexibility. (Can’t swing my leg forward in a warrior pose to save my life – ouch, my hips!)
- I think about nature and I’m curious about the natural world has to teach me.
- I wonder about how to hold on to my beliefs and convictions without needing to “make my case” to others about how they need to think like I do. (And how does this translate to parenting, and guiding my kids?)
- Practicing relaxation- without shame!
- Wait, music… Does flow have a soundtrack?!
- I think about emotions or thought patterns (disappointment, frustration, shame, etc) that get “in the way” of flow, and wonder what it might look like not to banish them, but to almost befriend them – or use them? – like an ally to flow.
So yeah, apparently there’s a lot puttering around in my brain. Writing it out may be a flow of it’s own… it helps a lot!
I’ll try to check in via this blog, as I “feel out” flow in 2022.
alive. awake. uncomfortable. 