Breathing

I just noticed I don't think I have been breathing. Really breathing. I am just rushing around, and don't take the time for a breath, 'cause breathing can lead to thinking. And we where know where thinking leads us.

With my retail websites in full swing for the  Holiday Season I'm in super crush mode. As the orders come in I am immediately caught up in processing them. I feel frantic and anxious and panicky. And for the first time I stop and ask myself why?

I mean I want the orders—income. I want the orders—keep me busy. I want the orders—define who I am. And then it hits me. Another of these slamming into the wall insights.

Last year I was doing the exact same things. Working with the same people. Filling out the same shipping labels. Wrapping up items. Putting them in Priority Mail boxes. But it was always against the clock while I was at home. Because when I was done I would leap into my car and rush back to the hospital where Rob was waiting.

How do I adjust to the fact that I don't have to be anywhere? How do I break my mind set of pressure? And its my pressure, no external drivers. I feel my heart pounding in my chest just from writing this. Deja vu—all over again, the Time post. Deja vu—all over again, its all about me.

I do try to stop and catch my breath. Thought—breathing—tai chi. Rob and I learned tai chi together, practiced together and even taught together. We did our forms on the top of Mount Washington in New Hampshire, on the beaches in Maine, Massachusetts, California and many places in between. Maybe just maybe I can slow down enough to learn to breathe again.

I go to see my horses. Notice my energy is completely different, and I am breathing. The barn and my horses have always been a sanctuary for me. And now I find it is a place where I can and do indeed breathe.

I'm reading Pema Chodron's When Things Fall Apart and Michael A. Singer's The Untethered Soul and trying to put into practice what they write. To acknowledge thoughts and feelings, to separate from them and to let them go. To be more aware of what I'm feeling. I have to breathe to do this.

So when I get off the phone with a client and walk into the living room, as I was wont to do to discuss the call with Robert, I notice all the swirling energy that I bring with me. I notice my breath is up around my ears and I am positively vibrating. And this is from an enjoyable phone call! And I also acknowledge that I wander the house still expecting him to be in his usual places.

Rob used to tell me not bring this disruptive energy to him.To take a breath before I was going to talk about work. And I honestly didn't have a clue what he meant.

He wanted me to join him on a spiritual journey and to meditate more. Why could I not do this then? Now I look through his books on spirituality and meditation and take them off the bookshelf to read. To be closer to him? Searching for unanswerable answers?

I want to believe he knows I am on that journey now. I want to believe he is guiding me. I want to share his breath.