Old patterns guide us towards our desires.

what a gas.

There is a tension in all of us between what we desire and how we actually live, a tug that becomes especially noticeable in times of transition.

We desire to feel well rested, but we stay up late. We desire to build community, but we don’t call our friends back. We desire to be less attached to objects, but we find ourselves getting lost in bins of tchochkes in the discount bin at a consignment store.

We all have patterns that we slip into almost unconsciously, and the middle place tends to shine a glaring light on what may have felt unimportant and far less critical in the before times.

Here’s a piece of my before time: I am 21 or maybe 22, just graduated from college. I wake up early with an alarm clock and leave for a run. I come back with 30 minutes to shower, get ready and be at my job (conveniently right down the street from my now dead mom’s house where I’m living). I spend the day in a blur changing 1 year old’s diapers and “teaching” dance to 3 year olds (Katy Perry’s “Firework” was a big hit.) Evenings and weekends are full of scheduled social time with my boyfriend and friends, dance classes and teaching English as a foreign language to adult immigrants. I was awaiting a decision from the Peace Corps and filling my time up to the brim. I was busy, but busy was my M.O. and I don’t remember questioning it.

It’s been 10 years since that time, and I know how it feels to move at the authentic pace of my energy and body.

My body requires slowness.

My energy will combust if I don’t make a practice of taking a hot sec to chill without my phone in the morning.

A filled calendar is not nearly as satisfying as open, unscheduled space.

All of these things are true, and yet I have become far busier in the last few weeks than I want to be, yet again.

Under capitalism, busy is seductive.

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Busy tells me I am getting. shit. done.

Busy tells me I am doing. the. work.

Busy tells me I am achieving. my. goals.

I desire to have a slow and spacious life, and I do not.

I don’t enjoy working more than 15 hours/week at most, and between 4 diff jobs, I currently work about 42 hours/week.

Jokes on me, the pattern is repeating itself yet again, almost without my noticing.

The good news is, it’s not a big deal. This is not the first time this busy pattern has slipped back in, but this time there is no drama or self-shaming in the realization that here I am doing it again, saying yes yes yes to more more more.

I don’t take myself that seriously, and it’s much easier to see the truth from here.

The truth is that humans will hold tight to what is familiar even when the familiar thing is not what we want. We are all habitual, attachment oriented, and generally hot messes and I am no different. The other truth is that everything I say yes to that is not in alignment with my deepest desires will find a way to leave. The sooner I get honest, the more humorous this journey becomes and the easier it becomes to let go.

I thank this transition for re-directing me towards the slow, intentional, self-directed life I desire.

What desires has your time in the middle place revealed to you?