Tuesday, March 19, 2019

Right Here, Right Now


Mindfulness is the practice of being in this moment — right here, right now. I teach children in school on this subject. I do breathing exercises, I have them close their eyes to focus on their surroundings, I have them slow down and pay attention to details. I worked with a group of six and seven year old this morning, and it was a particularly challenging morning for them to focus. I came home and realized I am having the same difficulty focusing myself. As I write this, my phone is distracting me with emails and texts, I am having a smoothie between typing, and my head is all over the place. I am by no means practicing what I preach.

I am feeling a bit overwhelmed lately. I have a big event I am planning, my schedule feels a bit busier than usual, I am making lists but I am putting the lists in so many different places, so I am having trouble figuring out what to do first. I am trying to balance being productive while also knowing when to chill out. I definitely don't know how to do the latter so easily, but I suppose that is why mindfulness is often referred to as a "practice." Time management is not my strongest skill, so I have started to look in to ways to help me, like timers, or apps, but I am not the most tech savvy so when I start messing with a time saving app, I lose time trying to figure it out.

Since acknowledging my head is spinning doesn't seem to stop the thoughts flying around, I will try to get some of them out here. I don't sleep enough.  I need to start the washing machine. I wonder if Target will take back a pair of pants my husband bought without a receipt. I don't really like going to ask that. My lips are so chapped. I hope I am not coming down with something. I need to get groceries, and make some work calls before I pick up the kids, and I can't figure out which of those two things to do first. What should I make for dinner tonight? What else do I need at the store while I am out? I'm so tired, I wonder if I could squeeze in a 20 minute nap before picking the kids up at school.

Now that I got that all out, I will start knocking them down one by one. If nothing else today I am going to try and remind myself that I can only really do one thing well at a time. Even if it means focusing right here right now for a few minutes at a time, that is my goal for today. If those first graders can do it, I can too. Granted, they don't have email accounts or phone numbers, but I am up for a challenge.





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