A blurred and unfocused photograph, caught off guard and off-center. Often found in your camera reel, unsure of where or when it happened.
Like these common photos, my mind has been in a fog. There has been far too much going on and also not enough.
It's been almost a month since I've been at work, and I have never been so busy. Those first few weeks, I'm not sure how I even did it.
Early mornings, late nights, and multiple projects. Shop move, name change, renos.
Then it all stopped. Well, it didn't really, but I did. My mind, body, and soul had reached its breaking point, and it sure as hell was going to tell me. My body cried out in pain anguish, screaming at me, "Rest!Rest! It's time for rest.".
Self care has been more than absent in my life for months now, and I don't believe this has all been a result of only recent events.
Sitting around the fire last night, I was blessed with good company. We contemplated the stars, the Solstice, and our lives as one does when sitting at a fire. I was asked, "What's it like not working?". I knew the answer they were wanting to hear was, "Amazing! Relaxing, I do whatever I please, whenever I please!"
But the only word that came to mind was exhausting.
I'm exhausted, plain and simple. And like the blurry photograph, I'm trying to put the pieces together, and figure out the story.
Right now, I KNOW I will be exhausted for a great deal of time to come. My body needs to be.
Right now, I KNOW I will need an absurd amount of time to rest. My spirit needs it.
Right now, I KNOW that I need to get reacquainted with myself. My mind needs it.
But right now, I know I do not live in a society that allows this. Right now I know that we are told we MUST work. We must put the majority of our waking hours to go to jobs we'd rather not, to pay bills we shouldn't have to.
To live in a society un-awakened to what human nature is really about, is crushing.
To know what your mind, body, and spirit NEEDS to survive, to see the fellow beings around you silently crying out for the same things, but to know we won't be allowed these freedoms.
We adorn our homes, our vehicles, our phones with sayings of, "Live! Laugh! Love", in ironic stances against realty.
I love my job. I am one of the few lucky ones to be able to do something I'm passionate about for a living. But that's just it, I HAVE to do it for a living. And right now, I don't have the stamina, the energy, or the mindfulness to go back.
But I will have to. I will give myself some more time, give my body time to heal.
And I can hope that in that short time I will find what it is that I need. What it is my spirit needs to become alive once again.
To remember how it feels to LIVE 💖💖💖
