I think I’ve figured out one of my problems, or do we just call them issues now?

Clearly I have a few, but I’ve recognized this one is one of my bigger stumbling blocks.

Now that I can see it, I think I just might be able to work around it. Of course, like so many of my epiphanies, the odds are quite high that I’ve probably had this realization already some time in the past, but forgive me…because it feels brand new.

And that is; I have this notion that my life, as in MY LIFE, should travel along in this prescribed manner, and that anything that happens that is different than that is viewed as some sort of interruption.

To give an example. Ever since my return from India in October, I wanted to have time for my ‘real’ writing but we did a big move and then I went to Palm Springs and I wanted to travel out to Abbotsford to see my father once a week and then it was December and there were presents to wrap and things to do and people to see, and yes, I actually enjoyed each thing. Or to put it another way,  I really tried to pay attention to whatever I was doing and worked at being fully present.

Eckhart Tolle would have surely given me a big fat shiny star for my exemplary behaviour, but there was still a part of me that was waiting for my REAL LIFE to kick back into gear and for all these other things to leave me alone so I could get on with how things are supposed to go.

Hmm…on second thought, Mr. Tolle might have peeled that star right off my combo to-do list and calendar.

So. I’m not sure if this is me taking control of my life or finally giving it up.

But this is what I know right now. I know that my life is all of these things. That I can’t just practise being oh-so-present, if I’m also secretly ticking it off my list so my REAL life can begin again.

This is my real life.

All of this stuff, appointments, errands, scrubbing the toilet and taking out the recycling and having fun, yes fun!

I have seen what happens when there is no more chaos, no interuptions, nothing but mind-numbing routine. I see it in the warehoused elderly that includes my father. You become so institutionalized that anything different throws you into a complete whirling state of anxiety. One day is the same as the next. There is nothing to get excited about, nothing to look forward to, just the same, same, same. Is that really what I was hoping for?

Routine is a lovely thing but it is not the point. I see it now as a suggestion, a framework or perhaps just a platform to work from.

Yes, that’s it. It’s a springboard and my goal is to keep bouncing.

Happy New Year.  Enjoy your life. Whatever it looks like and in whatever form it comes at you, because apparently, THIS IS IT.