“I am not what happened to me, I am what I choose to become.” Carl Jung
The word practice can call up images of mothers calling us to do dreaded scales on the piano or learning something that’s a little hard. Resistance sets in immediately. It must be part of the natural order!
I took some vacation time last week to be with family. I didn’t bring any work but was able to enjoy every minute of my time with them. I tried to practice being loving and keeping my mouth shut when it was appropriate.
I noticed a few things about practice having been away from it for a little time.
We need breaks from everything. Practice, though, gives us the opportunity to raise our awareness.
A good example of this is reading something you love many times. It can be a quote, a verse, a story- it doesn’t matter. When you re-read it after a few times, you start to see more meaning, deeper meaning, different meaning. You realize that there is the surface meaning and sometimes many more layers of meaning. Who knew?
I’ve been working on my own practice of encouraging myself in this project. I’ve had a great amount of support through all of you, but the path is still hazy and some days it seems easier to let it all go.
The thing that keeps me moving, is knowing that encouragement the thing we need most – all the time. The pure irony of it is that it’s the thing we are most casual about executing.
Today, listen for people telling stories of how encouragement kept them moving towards a goal. You’ll hear it everywhere when you start listening. It may blow your mind.