So Much More
You are more than what you do, dearest.
You are more than the emails you send, the dinners you make, the meetings you attend.
You are more than your risks, more than your failures, more than the stumbling blocks that continue to pepper your progress.
You are more than the money you make, the clothes you buy, the car that takes you from here to there.
You are more than what you get done, more than what you create, more than whatever gets crossed off your To-Do list.
Know this. You do not need to prove anymore.
You do not need to chronicle all you did today to know you're deserving of love. You do not need to catalog how hard your day was to prove you're worthy of care. You do not need to name a single action to know you're entitled to rest.
You are deserving, worthy and entitled to whatever you need, right now, before you've accomplished a thing.
Today take the rest your body craves.
Take the time your mind requires. Feed your joy, feed your loves, feed your heart with what feels good and easy and true in this unique moment.
Today, be the care that the soft animal of your body desires. Care for her as a beloved child and notice all the ways in which she thanks you, for it is care that is the foundation of our lives.
If you enjoyed this post, please keep reading!
As a self care coach, schedule buffering is one of my go to self care tips after a big presentation, after a work trip, after solo parenting, after a holiday party, and after any sort of transition. I make sure to enter slowly. I don't over commit. I leave LOTS of space for me to take it easy and move at a slower pace rather than slamming into the next thing after having just put so much out.
Women are uniquely tasked with carefully navigating the way we interact with the people around us. We aren't to make anyone mad. We can't let anyone down. We mustn't offend anyone. Don't even think of hurting anyone's feelings. And don't you dare inconvenience anyone.
Truth is, many of us are amazing shit-picker-uppers. It doesn’t matter who the shit belongs to, if someone drops a steaming pile of it in front of us, we always pick it up. Always.
I've been thinking a lot about change recently. It's as if every time I catch my breath and get used to life "as it is", something shifts. There's a change in the world. A change in my 3 year old's sleep pattern. A change in my body. A change in the law.
Change, change, everywhere change.
In my 15 years of coaching I've had countless clients ask me, "If I know I want to be less controlling in my life, why do I keep defaulting to it?" There are a number of reasons why we seek to control. Many of us developed controlling behaviors as children to create a sense of stability and safety in an otherwise chaotic/unsafe environment.
For most of my life I toggled between wanting to be a "good girl" and wanting to tell people (and systems) to leave me the f*ck alone. It was a hard line to walk with one part of me wanting to be liked and held in "high-standing" and the other feeling put upon, judged and resenting it.
Question for you: What were you taught about slowness? Perhaps you were taught that slowness is a form of laziness. Perhaps you internalized the message that going slow is a waste of precious time. Maybe you see slowness as the antithesis of productivity or worse, that slowness is a reflection of low intelligence.
Since January began, my partner Adam and I have been randomly looking at each other and making an exasperated "BLAH!" face. It's the face we use when either of us is feeling uninspired, listless or just, well, BLAH.
As the days shorten we find our bodies naturally craving slowness and inwardness.
This conversation is between myself and an incredible woman named Ani, who shares how she learned how to be authentic, practice self-compassion, and take up space without guilt or shame through my 6-month group coaching program, Homecoming. Ani is a model for how to excavate internalized misogyny and live authentically without fear of others’ opinions. The conversation originally took place on podcast, The Path Home.