“Workation,” I thought that was a great term! I love heading to Duluth to work because it always feels as much like a vacation as work even though I am seeing clients the entire time that I am there. I expected the same experience this last time I headed North to “work” for the weekend. I stayed at a VRBO in the craft district and had romantic visions of strolling down the street in the evenings enjoying the nightlife of the area… that is not what happened. Just to be clear.
It rained… the entire. Weekend.
Rain.
Ugh.
Saturday after work I was planning a longish hike in the hillside… delayed and cut short by rain. Sunday after work I was planning a nice hike along a little creek I know of… except this afternoon the rain was… um… thicker. It was slushing outside. No hike.
As I sat and stewed about my disappointment I thought of all the things I could do instead; get caught up on emails, read a book, look at video content ideas, watch TV, go find an indoor mall to get lost in, or I could do the nagging journaling that my heart had been crying for for days, that I kept ignoring and leaning into my usual busyness so I could avoid.
Crap.
I have felt heavy lately… like in my heart, and my mind and my Spirit. Nothing “wrong,” just a lot of discomfort. Some I can change, some I can not, some is probably just an attitude adjustment, some is my perpetual lack of patience, some is discontentment and wondering what else I “should” be doing, some is just gray area I don’t know what it is but I know I don’t’ like it.
Yeah, me too.
I have heard so many stories lately from people who are feeling very similar so it shouldn’t be any surprise that in my humanness I am feeling this too. Sometimes when folks are talking to me about what is going on with them I even find myself thinking, “well, I guess it’s not just me” which brings me a bit of relief.
I have been trying so hard to ignore it. And yet, here we are.
As I began to journal to read what I was writing, to hear my own inner thoughts from an objective standpoint there were multiple times I stepped into and then back out of knowing. Like intuitive direct knowing. Like there is no use in pretending or ignoring because here is the truth of the matter, kind of knowing. Through resistance, bargaining, bartering, exhaustion, frustration, downright anger, finally came some give.
In the end nothing life changing was discovered or uncovered. But there were a few points of clarity: There was acknowledgment of places where I am so off balance I can’t even figure out what recovery would look like. There is clarity in what I love and what I am willing to give myself to and for, and what I just won’t and can’t anymore. There are people and relationships that I have to acknowledge have changed in ways I don’t care for, and there is nothing I can do about it, so I am focusing towards acceptance. I guess there was kind of a lot uncovered.
I grant myself Grace in the continual getting to know myself. As an evolutionary being, surrounded by other evolutionary beings I guess I really can’t expect things to just stay the same, and I recognize, as is true for all of us, that what works and what doesn’t as life goes on, is always available to us through self awareness if we want to stop long enough to recognize it.
Sometimes ah-ha moments are challenging. It means having to do and think and align differently than we have. It’s ok. I am enough for this journey, as Spirit reminds us often, and I packed everything I needed when I came here. Spirit is wise, I just have to remember to leave the fear that is constant distraction, to just be still and listen, and align.
It really isn’t so scary. I probably shouldn’t work so hard to avoid it.
Forever the journey, Anne