30 July 2010

An excuse to pause...

We arrived for our mini-vacation up in Thompson last night, after 7.5 hours in a SMART car - yes, you heard me!  It was surprisingly roomy and it only cost $24 in gas!  So now that I'm here, I've got forced relaxation on the brain.  I'm a pretty impatient person and I put a lot of pressure on myself to feel like I'm accomplishing things. Sometimes you take a holiday to relax and recharge.  But life has a sneaky way of forcing little pauses on us throughout the day, every day.


I'd like to be more aware of these pauses and use them to my advantage.  To take a deep breath,  relish the moment or take note of my gratefulness.  New agey?  Maybe.  What I'm gonna do anyway?  Yup!

Think of all the little pauses you encounter throughout your day.  Like...

Waiting for your computer to load something...

Sitting in your car at a stoplight...

Waiting in line at the grocery store...

Riding the elevator...

Cooking something in the microwave...

Waiting for the dog to 'do his business'...

Calling someone and waiting for the phone to pick up...

Turning on the shower until the water heats up...

Waiting on hold to order pizza delivery...

Waiting for your toenail polish to dry...

There's so many!  So even when I'm crazy busy, I'm going to work harder to embrace the pauses.

How do you take time to recharge?

7 comments:

  1. I will now pause my bloging to go make another cup of coffee!

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  2. I don't do it enough! I read before sleeping, but since I'm looking after kids all day I typically put their needs before mine. Not always smart. I'm going to look for the pauses today.

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  3. i needed to warm my tea in the microwave today so i took the time to sweep the kitchen a little and i realized that i had been "on the go" for the entire day. so i'm with you on the pausing thing and take that same moment to stop + breath instead.

    lovely post dear!

    xo Alison

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  4. enjoy the heck out of your vacay :)

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  5. oh I love this. I've been doing LOTS of thinking about this. Yoga and other religions speak of this pause, perhaps prayer, just living in the moment and breathing as essential to true happiness. thanks for this lovely post.

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  6. This is so true! You can sit at the red light, waiting impatiently, tapping your fingers, flipping through radio stations, scowling. Or you can accept it and breathe in the fresh air or actually notice the scenery around you. It totally changes things!

    I try to make time every day - even just 5 or 10 minutes - to sit in our back yard with the dog. No music, no book, no telephone. Just sitting quietly.

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  7. Thanks for all your great suggestions and reflections! Eva, I love the idea of just sitting with the dog - although that means you have to get the dog to 'just sit' quietly too! Sometimes easier said than done...

    XO
    Lenore

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Thanks so much for stopping by, I love reading all your comments! If you have a specific question, please email me at lhume1@mts.net. XO Lenore