There was a time in my life where I was extremely busy.
I was working full time in an investment banking company in downtown SF, plus teaching meditation and healing in my apartment at night, plus doing a side business other nights and weekends. There were some points where I had a relationship life, but not always. I was trying to accomplish my goals, but I can’t say I was happy going about it. I was too busy running from one thing to another, and had a lot of worries about whether I was going to get things done.
There reached a crisis point, after Psychic Horizons had been formed, and I had stopped working downtown. Instead, I was working at the school 60-80 hours/week, making sure the school was successful and would survive. I loved doing that, but again, the amount of work I was doing caught up with me.
I experienced a ruptured appendix. At first, I thought I had a stomach flu. But the pain got so bad I went to the emergency room at 3 am, and while I was in the waiting room filling out medical insurance paperwork, my appendix burst. I could feel it like intensely painful stars erupting in my stomach area. I told the nurse my appendix had ruptured.
The surgeon was called and I had emergency surgery at about 5 am. The doctor later told me later that it was the worst case of a ruptured appendix he had ever seen. I was in the hospital for about a week, and on heavy-duty antibiotics for about a month, and wasn’t able to work for 7 weeks.
I’m sure my body had given me warning signs before, but I was so focused on what I needed to do, that I hadn’t listened. This time, it was abundantly clear that my body told me to slow down. Given what I had been through, I obeyed!
From that time on, I set my life up so that I had spaces.
By that I mean I created space between each thing I was doing, such as 5-10 minutes in between different tasks, and I made energy completions after each task. I made sure what when I had lunch I wasn’t working, that there was space. I stopped teaching as many classes and cut back on the amount of hours I was working.
I made separations so that when I was home, I was home and had space. I didn’t give out my phone number to students. I took walks, and rode my mountain bike with a friend on a weekly basis. I always made time to meditate. Basically I made space in my life for myself aside from work, and even in my work, and it changed my perspective on how to live.
In the Step 1 class, we look at the various ways in which people ground. Grounding creates a sense of security for each person. Generally, people ground through work, money, family and relationships, their home, their phone and computer, food, and busy-ness. Being busy makes people feel secure and productive, like they’re doing something important with their lives. And that can definitely be true.
But when I ask people who are always busy if they’re happy with how their lives are going, the answer is often “not really”.
Are you busy? Are you happy?
We tend to look at what we want to accomplish, or what we think we should accomplish. Sometimes that purpose of accomplishment is based on our own values, and sometimes it’s based on the values of others, such as parents or co-workers or the expectations of the culture or even the culture of a company or agency for which one works. Sometimes it’s based on how much money we want or on how much we think we can help others. Sometimes people are afraid if they’re not busy, perhaps afraid of silence or of “empty” space.
But I’m convinced that the purpose of life is not just accomplishment, although that can be very satisfying and even purposeful.
One of the purposes of who we are as spirit in body is to enjoy life.
My belief is that one of the purposes of who we are as spirit in our body is to enjoy life, and to have joy — not necessarily because of anything we do or accomplish but because we are here on this planet and there is much to enjoy.
If we do not enjoy our life, what is there really? Are we going to go through this life and other lifetimes unhappy about our lot in life? Guess what, we’ve already done that!
There is so much about life that we invalidate, or judge, or dislike, or are angry about. But there is so much to enjoy. As a spiritual being in this universe and on this planet, I want to be able to identify life in my body as something I want to do and participate in. I want to be present. I want life to be interesting, and purposeful, and joyful. I have created work that I enjoy and is very purposeful, but I also enjoy food, and drink, and walking next to the water, and having coffee on a deck somewhere. I like watching the Giants play baseball. To me, enjoyment is everywhere, and we need to let ourselves have it.
If we can learn the lesson of enjoyment, then that’s a huge lesson. That is something we can take everywhere we go, and into everything that we do. .
As always, thanks for supporting Psychic Horizons & the Church of Natural Grace with your sustainable giving! It truly makes a difference, both for us and for you.
Best regards,
Rev. Laura Hopper
Originally published July 23, 2018