Making Necessary Changes

The power of dialing in our focus

Lately, I’ve been feeling split. I’m not able to give my full attention and love to things and people like I really want to. We live in a world that’s all about multitasking and managing all the different things we achieve and acquire- God forbid we put any of it down- more, more, more!

At the very least, I’m putting my foot down. Actually, I’m working on putting both of my feet down, specifically in the places I want to keep growing. I am gradually releasing my “need” to return to places that no longer feel aligned. I am in the process of consolidation. After writing that, I decided to look up the definition of consolidation:

noun

1. the action or process of making something stronger or more solid.

2. the action or process of combining a number of things into a single more effective or coherent whole.

For one of multiple personal examples (yes, if we’re seeing a concept/pattern in one area of life, it’s showing up in all areas), writing is something into which I want to pour more of myself. However, I have not had more to give. I laughed with my brother-in-law yesterday, who said he is the ham sandwich of what he does (I disagree by the way- he’s an incredible writer, singer, producer, and musician). I can’t remember his exact quote about the ham sandwich, but he said something like: “You’ll eat it, and it gets the job done, but it’s not excellent.” It inspired me the way he said it so lightheartedly. Meanwhile, if you know him, you know he has been honing his craft for his entire life. To some that could seem discouraging. “You mean to tell me, it takes 30 years just to become a proverbial ham sandwich?” No, we’re not talking about timelines or formulas here. We’re talking about finding something you love so much that you never want to cease the exploration of it.

I am so grateful to have found that in writing and yoga. I’ve only been writing publicly since 2022. I’ve only been practicing yoga regularly since 2021 and teaching since the spring of 2023. If Aaron is a ham sandwich, I am basically a paper plate at this point.

As we all know (and still do anyway), it’s not about comparison. I’m going to roll with my metaphor here. I’m looking at this paper plate and realizing, yes, it will hold my sandwich, but I’m putting the cart before the horse. Not only are there better plates out there, there are so many more steps to take first in order to prepare a really good sandwich. I’ve slowed down enough to realize that I don’t even want a ham sandwich. I’m a vegetarian. I think I want… an artisan, Mediterraneanesque veggie sandwich. I begin to think more intentionally about the ingredients. Do I want it hot or cold? Hot. I want eggplant with an egg-flour-panko batter, seasoned and fried in the pan first. The details I can think about are endless. I can’t wait to drizzle that balsamic glaze over everything between the bread. Even once I pick the kind of cheese (mozzarella, duh), there are different variations of that one kind of cheese I can pick! I choose burrata- mmmmmm.

You get the picture.

It’s not that the ham sandwich is wrong. I have had very good times with it, and it stands alone as a faithful go-to. I also don’t have to settle for it if it’s no longer aligned with who I naturally am.

We can all plug in our own details for what this represents in our life.

What are you allowing yourself to move on from?

What are you beginning to choose more consciously?

I hope you enjoy this week’s daily contemplations.

Love, me.

SUNDAY

REINFORCEMENT

Keep softening, even with the blows of grief. The connected web of you is flexible and can move in any direction. By expanding, contracting, pushing, and pulling, you become capable of moving with more. When something pushes you farther than you’ve gone before, pull back and catch your breath. A full exhale comes after a full inhale. Keep going within to reach your full potential (out). There, you will find the provisions of your next steps. Support is always developing in the underground, in the background. Believe it is there, and it will be near to you. Release any grip that takes all of your energy. Drape over what catches you when you do. Allow yourself to be heavy, surrendering to the support. You don’t have to move again until authentic life draws you out. Be here, and be shaped by what is helping you. Move with the grain. Fight nothing. You don’t have to see it all right now. Something else is seeing you in the picture. Stay where you are, and what is for you will come to you. It is not time to pack up or break down. Keep softening, even with the blows of grief.

MONDAY

BELIEF

You will do what you think. Henry Ford said “Whether you think you can or think you can't, you're probably right.” You have not been brought all this way to be dropped. However, if you are determined to stay here or go backward, then that’s the way you’ll ultimately go. Where are your sights set? If they are where you want them, maintain a steady focus there. We are taking actions that lead to either attention or distraction. Look for the connecting thread or threads that carry over day to day, week to week, month to month. Look for what they are producing in your life. Trust that this wants to continue. Just because you feel weak, doesn’t mean you are breaking. It means you are having a human experience. See things through to the end. Open fully to the beginning. Full speed ahead. You will do what you think. 

TUESDAY

PHOTOSYNTHESIS

You have something to offer. There will always be continuing education, and you don’t have to withhold yourself from sharing your gifts any longer. A book of the Bible called Ephesians advises us to never doubt the power within ourselves. Whether it was a divine source who created us, or some beautiful boom of the universe, can you tell me what the difference is? “...mighty power to work in you and accomplish all this… [God] will achieve infinitely more than your greatest request, your most unbelievable dream, and exceed your wildest imagination!” Whether you are finishing or starting one of the many races of life, finish it or start it fully, with all of you. It is all a part of your undoing and becoming. Remember the unchanging source of light, as it also mentions in Ephesians- “...miraculous power constantly energizes you. Now we offer up to God all…that will yet be manifest through time and eternity.” Lift yourself out of the stem and into the flower. You are the stem, and you are the flower. There is nothing left to hold back. You have something to offer.

For an outline of this book of contemplations in process, refer to this post. The following contemplations will begin the month of August in the book, which holds the theme of

BLOOM

WEDNESDAY

INCLINATION

Follow your natural tendency, and you will find your nature. It clicks now; there is no strive necessary to earn blessings that have always been yours. Dissolved are your efforts to prove that you deserve your own best life. The truth is, you don’t, because you can’t. It has always been yours, so there is only to forget it or to live it. Are you ready to accept it? It is another surrender to a greater will of life, who wants to nurture and expand you as you were created to be. Surrender to where you are being taken. Here is another reminder that it’s not too good to be true. Stay soft, directable, and moldable to ultimately become a conduit for something magnificent, beyond what you ever imagined. Before you get stuck in the beyond, come back to this moment. There is no rush to move. Take your time. Listen to your inner knowing. Follow your natural tendency, and you will find your nature.

THURSDAY

ENVELOP

It’s darkest before dawn. The caterpillar is inside the cocoon before it becomes the butterfly. The flower’s petals wrap around it before they open and bloom. We are asleep before we are awake. We are dead before we are alive. Allow your current surrounding conditions to form a cloak around you. You have been in the dark before. Remember, down in the dirt, when all that has manifested in your life was just a tiny little seed? You will open and expand once again, as long as you first let everything take shape around you, in the light. Keep focused faith and let what is good come to you. It’s darkest before dawn. 

FRIDAY

DIRECT

A masterpiece is created by tending to the micropieces within it. Things take time to fully form, let alone to reach their highest potential. The magnificence of the result is of equal degree to that of the process. Discover what is for you here and now, and you will no longer be plagued by the outcome. Tend to your spirit. Our mind and body can’t function without our spirit, our breath of life. Nonetheless, the mind has the capacity to collect experiences and data and, after a while, it is able to run on its own based on those patterns. We mistake it’s automated running for reality. All of a sudden, you might be thankful to be held in the place here for the time being. Take the time to distinguish between what is the mind on autopilot, from old experiences, and what your true nature is asking of you. It is part of your innate power to instruct the mind in ways that work with your authenticity. You only feel lost when you forget you are being guided. Every part matters, at least enough to notice. By intently observing everything in your external surroundings, without attachment, and continually consulting your inner voice, the understanding comes of what to keep and what to release. A masterpiece is created by tending to the micropieces within it. 

SATURDAY

RECOVER

Restore balance. As you change, what you want and need changes. Old vices might not do the trick anymore. There may be a remedy for these unfamiliar troubles which you never considered before. Your inner and external world are no longer so compartmentalized from each other. They prompt one another. The same light above is still feeding and illuminating your growth. You have developed enough into this environment that it helps sustain you. Receive its sustenance today. Catch up to yourself. Feel everything you need to feel. Be with what is, even if it hurts. You will then know and recognize the joy, which always comes again. Self care is not always comfortable. There are toxins that give temporary relief and perpetuate the grief. Then there are antidotes, which might make the grief feel worse at first, only because they counteract it when, left to its own devices, it would otherwise keep feeding itself. Find your light again. All that you see is a projection of how you feel inside. If you are tired, the world is difficult and heavy. Take care of yourself. There is no rush. Restore balance.