{ the FUNK }

An adult is one who has lost the grace, the freshness, the innocence of the child,
who is no longer capable of feeling pure joy, who makes everything complicated,
who spreads suffering everywhere, who is afraid of being happy, and who,
because it is easier to bear, has gone back to sleep. The wise man is a happy child.
-Arnaud Desjardins

I've been in a funk lately...A summer is ending; bus-stop blues; I feel OLD; I don't feel super inspired lately, twilight-induced FUNK. Not sure what to make of it other than it is not ME. I am emotional, down, tired, distracted, uninspired, etc...all things that have me reeling on a daily basis and have my husband looking at me wondering where his happy wife has gone?

I am working on choosing self-care over all other things I must be doing this week. I think the key to snapping out of this FUNK is mindful self-care... not "lazy sitting on the couch watching bad TV," or watching "Twilight" again, self-care. But mindful, deeper, truer self-care and connections with the people around me, but mostly with my husband, my partner, my best friend. I'm going to go climb a mountain with him. I'm going to go away for a weekend with him (without the kids). I am going to pick up a book that is not about vampires. I am going to get myself back to yoga class. I am going to continue to cleanse and purge the space around ME which helps me feel calmer & lighter. I am going to remember to breathe. I am going to continue to seek {acres of grace}. I might even go back to church. I'm going to get back on a better routine for ME & my family, working to reduce the chaos that tends to creep back into our lives. I am going to re-find that excitement that we had when we first meet. I am going to blast music in our house everyday and have a dance party. I am going to get ME back.

So, I'm going to take a brief hiatus from the blog to work on RE-connecting with ME and those around ME. I'm pushing my re-set button and I'm going to get my mojo back. Be back soon my friends. xoxo ~

In the meantime I leave you with this passage from Sailing Home by Norman Fischer.

Few of us are willing to actually be ourselves. Mostly, we deny, berate, or ignore ourselves, preferring self-deception, judgementalism, or just plain oblivion. Being ourselves involves awareness and acceptance of our craftiness and our imperfection-and this awareness tames us, so that we can understand and appreciate our quirks and the quirks of others. It gives a broader, deeper perspective.

Perfection is not our spiritual goal. We do not aspire to be Nobody. We are and need to be Somebody, wily and crafty enough to interact with others, but avoiding the risk of puffing ourselves up and becoming swollen and blind with self-concern. But to be Somebody in a balanced way, without overdoing it, we need to appreciate the experience of being Nobody from time to time.

To be Nobody is not to enter some fantastic condition of ego-lessness. It is simply to be willing and able, when it is time, to drop the self, to let Somebody go and surrender to circumstances. We do this as a discipline when we give ourselves over in meditation or in prayer. We do it too, in those rare but always absorbing moments of abandonment that can come in art or work or love. We might need to do it at any moment of living- to let go on a moment's notice of what we think we are and what we think we want, and be willing to turn around on a dime, trusting what comes instead of evaluating and resisting it. To be Nobody is to float on the ocean of stories with faith, and without thrashing around too much, willing to wait for the proper current to take us where we need to go.