How Brains Work

I am back to being busy.  Just like most people.  We are working, taking care of our children, helping in our communities.  Sometimes we are busy staying or getting healthy.  Somewhere along the line I learned that being busy was important.  I learned that getting things accomplished meant I had value and worth. 

Over the last 25 or 30 years I got addicted to being busy.  Internally I thought, if I had nothing to do I wasn't worth anything to anyone, even to myself.   At times busy thoughts attacked my brain to the point where I joked that I had monkey mind.  I swore there were monkeys careening around in my brain unwilling to let me settle down and be at peace.  Or maybe that is just the ADHD.

Cancer changed things.  Being sick caused me to look at being busy and time differently. This last week as I have been plunged back into work, I see those busy feelings chattering like monkeys, just at the edge of my sight, threatening to come back in. I am doing my best to keep them caged and out of my mind.

When I was in treatment, it was much easier to treat each day just as it was.  To sit and watch the sun rise and set from my chair.  To breathe and deal with the pain and understand my body and reflect.  I rarely had thoughts of wash that needed to be done or dishes that needed to be cleaned or projects that deserved more time than I am capable of giving at work.

How can I just be (not do!) and have value?  I think that is a tough lesson in American culture.   I am imperfect, scarred and damaged.  We are all.  What am I afraid of? How come when I was sickest and I had the most time I was most accepting of myself? 

I keep thinking that I have to rush to get done.  I have to get enough money to retire (and isn't that looking more difficult every day!), I want to reach my growth goals for my business, eat healthy and be active physically (which takes work at any age!) and the list goes on.

I realize that the I am my best on my bike.  There is no hurry.  On the bike, I am in the moment.  Of course, there is no rush because I'm a very slow bike rider.  It just is.  I am the same when I do yoga. 

For now, I am not looking forward.  I am living in the moment.  I will appreciate all that I have and that I am.  I will try to keep the monkeys in the trees in the distance.