How do you respond to being asked to wait? Enjoy waiting
This week, observe how you behave when you are required to wait for something whether it is a bus, a friend, a coffee, an email, an answer. Check in with how you respond to being asked to wait. See if you can embrace this waiting time as a gift rather than an inconvenience. Many of us feel our frustration building when we are in a queue or stuck in traffic. In this digital age have become programmed for immediate gratification and our brains have become wired for instant hits. However, this impulse to get what we want NOW works against us and creates cortisol (the stress hormone) when our needs are not immediately met.
Part of the mindfulness movement is about creating “brain breaks” from our over-scheduled minds; when we are required to wait, life presents us with a golden opportunity to enjoy the moment when nothing is expected of us but to simply be. Changing our perspective on waiting from frustration to mental freedom from doing allows life to flow positively at all times.
This week, enjoy waiting!
To forget the mistakes of the past
and press on to the greater achievements of the future.
To wear a cheerful countenance at all times
and give every living creature you meet a smile.
To give so much time to the improvement of yourself
that you have no time to criticize others.
To be too large for worry, too noble for anger, too strong for fear,
and too happy to permit the presence of trouble.
To think well of yourself and to proclaim this fact to the world,
not in loud words but great deeds.
To live in faith that the whole world is on your side
so long as you are true to the best that is in you.”
― Christian D. Larson, Your Forces and How to Use Them
As the evenings are becoming brighter, if you find the opportunity to go for a walk one evening this week, take it! A gentle, solitary stroll where you focus all of your attention outside yourself on what you can see, hear and smell is a good mental workout to calm a busy mind after a stressful or long day. By choosing to use your focus in this way, you will be open to a general sense of calm and well-being. You may even allow yourself to experience the wonder of hearing the birds sing at twilight. Thinking outside youself
This week, allow yourself to dream of achieving whatever it is that you really desire. Don’t limit yourself to ‘small thinking’ but allow yourself the freedom to think big. What did you want to be as a child? What places did you want to visit? What made you feel alive? As adults, we often let go of childhood dreams such as becoming a famous footballer or a ballerina because we view the dream as unrealistic and question our capabilities to achieve it. “In dreams begin responsibilities”
Much of this self-doubt is influenced by society and the expectations on us, as adults, to be serious. This weight of responsibility makes it easy for us to drift very far from our original dreams, whatever they may be. W.B. Yeats famous phrase “in dreams begin responsibilities” alerts us to the idea that achieving our dreams is possible if we are responsible about how we go about realising this. If we simply give up on our dreams and take on the responsibility of being adults without the dream, then it appears that we have all of the responsibility and none of the fun! This week, dare to dream!
In each and every one of us there is a golden light of eternal love and hope that illuminates our spirits. It lives in our hearts and can be seen as our golden centre. When we tap into this part of us that is full of unconditional love and is not tied to the ego or attached to seeking external approval, we have a well of goodness from which to draw on every day.
Visualise your heart being filled with this golden light. Think of the natural light of the sun and of how your body and mind respond when you feel the sun shine on you. The more often you cultivate this light inside you the more you start to see it shine in everyone you meet. This can also be seen as the goodness that exists in us. Focus on the goodness in yourself and you will find it easier to extend this love outwards. This week, if someone behaves in a way that you find difficult, irritating or unfair then look beyond their behaviour and imagine their golden centre. When you really focus on this you become able to see that their behaviour does not represent the true essence of who they are.