Within the stillness

At least once a week, for the past month or so, I have woken up and felt a part of my body in a profound way. I guess life has a way of getting pretty demanding as you grow older. It is a time when the effortless grace of your childhood meets the uncertain reality of your adulthood, a love-hate relationship at best.

You see growing up, I knew that somehow my personhood would always be overshadowed by my achievements and this feeling was supercharged by the fact that I existed in a world which valued people for what they had accomplished as opposed to who they were.
Ultimately, as expected, being a dominant and competitive outlier became an identifying feature of my life, except that in this sense, all that was a euphemism for a deeply embedded fear of failure.

Looking back though, I am all the more grateful for what I have learnt over the past couple of months as it has helped me steer away from the dangerous messaging I had absorbed over a lifetime.I really cannot help but think that maybe it takes a world as tumultuous as this one to help us realise that happiness is not a point of arrival or a place of stay. That our lives are not carefully groomed worlds and that so little about our lives is actually simple. We are more potent, real and messy than we could possibly imagine.
That maybe what we need most is to be still and realise what is going on inside of us as opposed to what is working outside of us.
Here are 5 things that have helped me remain still even in this period of uncertainty.
1. Understanding that my value is far much greater than anything I could possibly accomplish in a lifetime.
2. Recognising the small things that are happening right now where I am
3. Understanding that it is okay not to see the bigger picture just yet.
4 . Viewing myself as a beautiful sunset, not paying too much attention, to whether each ray is shining to its fullest potential but acknowledging its beauty just as it is.
5. Lastly, understanding that my best will always look different everyday and that is okay.
In this very moment, I am allowing myself to be still and to be fully present for everything happening to me now even as I steer towards what it is that I really want. The still small voice in my heart has found more space to heard and all I can say is that I am so much better because of it.

I hope you give yourself the grace to be still, even in these current uncertain times.