I don’t know of a single day that passes that I don’t look at the clock at some point and realize I have to rush to get somewhere or get something done. There’s a reason (sometimes many reasons) each day to hurry and there’s usually something that I’m either late for, wish I’d arrived a little earlier for, or I wish I’d had more time to get to. I frequently drive too fast because I’ve left myself too little time to get where I’m going. I’m forever trying to squeeze a size 10 amount of things to do into a size 2 amount of time. And I’m frequently busting-out the seems of my day. This is a decades-old pattern.
Yesterday I tuned-in to my body as I was rushing to get to a commitment. I felt like a rioting crowd was fighting its way out of my cranium. My heart was pounding and my stomach was tight and clenched. Believe me, it didn’t feel good. Or healthy. And I know it isn’t. When I’m rushing I’m not taking very good care of myself. I want to change this pattern of daily rushing. I want to bring the calm and gentle assertiveness that I bring to my work and that I experience in my meditation practice to my daily personal schedule. I don’t yet have a plan, I just know that I want to make a change. It will be a learning process and, like all learning, it will also be a process of awakening. I’ll keep you posted.