Take a breath. A deep breath! And release. What does your breath have to tell you about the pace of your life? About the stresses you are experiencing? The tension in your body? Your level of energy?
Science tells us that following stress and activity, the body must replenish. Why then do we find it so challenging to rest? To balance work and rest? Doing with being? Time together with time apart? In stopping to catch our breath, to rest, we literally provide the means for living the active life.
Parker Palmer, in The Active Life, reflects on the difference between living an active life and a state of frenzy:
For some of us, the primary path to aliveness is the active life. The active life is an extraordinary mix of blessing and curse. The blessing is obvious… But the active life also carries a curse. Many of us know what it is to live lives not of action but of frenzy, to go from day to day exhausted and unfulfilled by our attempts to work, create, and care. Many of us know the violence of the active life… Action poses some of our deepest spiritual crises as well as some of our most heartfelt joys.
Where would you place yourself on the continuum between the active life and the frenzied life?
Over the next few weeks pay attention to your breath… and your schedule.
Take a breath. A deep breath! And release.