To listen to today’s Practice of BEing, please click BE PATIENT VIDEO.
Monday morning. . .which feels remarkably like Sunday morning and Saturday morning and Friday morning.
For most of us, Monday morning is the start of our weeks. Whether we still work or not, we habitually think of Mondays as a time to get going, get moving, get things done.
I’m a nomad. I normally live on the road. But right now I don’t. In fact, I haven’t gotten in my car in over two weeks. I haven’t gone into a grocery store or any other building except my own sweet cottage. Instead, I’ve walked and walked and walked. Sure I’ve worked every single day, but I’m grateful for the good work I have to do. But I haven’t gone anywhere. Nor will I for a while it would seem.
The funny thing is that I don’t feel antsy. In fact, I am filled with gratitude for being right here right now.
And yet, from time to time, I catch myself falling into old habits: Wishing I could go consume something — an experience, a road trip, an adventure, a new shop, a special culinary treat. And then I remember that all that consumption is a big contributor to our current situation. And I tell myself that being right here, right now, being grateful for being right where I am, really feeling what it’s like to have a tiny carbon footprint — this is MY part in learning what we are all going to have to learn how to do FROM NOW ON to heal our world.
Going back to normal is not an option. We all have to co-create a new normal. And we have to start doing it now.
So when i tell myself BE PATIENT — I don’t mean be patient. It will all be back to normal soon.
I mean BE PATIENT as this new way of being teaches us how to heal our world.
A guitar teacher once told me that it takes 30 days to change a habit.
I’ve been here close to 30 days, and I do feel different.
When I wish I could go for a nice long drive, I think to myself — what can you do instead that doesn’t send emissions out into the atmosphere? And I lace up my shoes and walk.
When, at the end of a long day of work, I think, I would love to buy something. The next thought is this: What so you can show off your new outfit to the squirrels you pass on your walk? And then I close the computer and happily go back to my jigsaw puzzle.
When I feel fear get my ear and I think, You know better. How can you possibly still be falling for that? I think, Fear is getting the whole world’s ear. This is another opportunity to learn how to listen to Love.
And when I wonder what the world will look like, how I’ll earn my living, where I will live once I leave this sweet little cottage and hit the road in a very different world, I think: You don’t need to know that right now. All you need to do is be grateful to be right here.
We live in an instant gratification two-day delivery world. We want it, we get it. Even if we have to go into debt to do it. Even if what we want isn’t good for us. And certainly with precious little thought about whether what we want is or isn’t good for someone else our planet.
This is what we all need to learn how to change!
When we are patient, we learn to wait without complaint. To do this is a game changer.
Many people are using warlike metaphors to describe this “battle” we’re all in right now. They hope to rally the forces and get everyone behind the cause of humanity. In that vein, here is what Gandhi said about patience: To lose patience is to lose the battle.
We’re in a battle not just to save lives now, but to save our whole world. And to do that each of us needs to keep learning how to lean into Love for everything we need instead of focusing only on our own individual human wills. This means we need to remember that we’re human beings not human doings — and to be human is to love love love love.
But this is an aircraft carrier that we’re turning around here. A way of life that is millennia old. Yes, Love is showing up big time in our world right now, doing what Love does — loving us whole! Love will have her perfect work. But our perfect work is to learn patience — with ourselves and one another as we all learn a new way of being.
So together, let’s all practice being more patient as we come together in a new way of being. In Love.
#LoveViral