Jessica
I have a dean at work who uses this phrase whenever she confronts something difficult or challenging. She says, “we’ll just take a deep breath,” in these situations. Of course, after she takes her deep breath, she does what she’s going to do anyway. I admire this moment of breathing before plunging in, like filling your lungs with air before submerging underwater.
I think it’s important to take deep breaths, even if you enjoy the task ahead. Even if it’s something that you love and look forward to, that moment to pause is crucial. It allows you to center yourself, bring oxygen to your muscles, and energize yourself before committing to a project.
I wanted to mark today all of the things that challenge me, in good and strange ways, for which I need to take deep breaths. Hopefully, it will remind me to pause, reflect, and breathe, before I rush in, screaming.
Today, I’m taking a deep breath because:
- My father is coming to town tonight. I love that I get to see him. He lives in Palm Springs and I see him about once a year. Having any family member visit for a few days tends to be a huge project. (I turn it in to a huge project.) There will be loads of fun and trips around the Twin Cities to things like the Highland Fest, Deep Blues Festival, and Aquatennial, but I expect that I will be exhausted come Monday.
- My body will heal on it’s own time. I’ve been pushing myself a bit, because of my dad’s visit, and I am kind of disappointed in my pace. I think I have to recognize all of the progress I’ve already made (off crutches and Frankenstein-ing around in a full leg brace) and that my leg has been through a major trauma and will need time to recover.
- I’ve stumbled upon a fun project on Facebook. You write a note offering a handmade gift to the first five people who respond. Lucky for me, five people from five different times in my life responded. I get to make a gift for a friend from high school, a friend from college, a student from my culinary school days, an online friend, and a Minneapolis friend. I already know my project for each of them and I can’t wait to get started. When I have time, I’m going to write more about the potential that social networking like Facebook presents for working artists/writers, because this experience reminded me of all we could do with it.
- At work, I feel like I have an infinite number of tasks to complete in a finite amount of time. Since I’m taking all sorts of sick time for doctor’s appointments and pre-arranged vacation time, I don’t know how I’m going to complete it all. This is when I need to breathe the most.
These are the things for this day, this week that are asking me to slow down and take a deep breath. What in your life is asking you to breathe deeply?
