Watching the Weather
So its Winter. Its cold.
I don't think I ever noticed that there were so many amazing things happening right now, in Winter. So often, at random times of the year, I shut down and pack up and figure I should go and hibernate because nothing that I want to happen is happening, and life seems slow. I get caught up in the season of my life. Have you ever heard that phrase? 'Season' of this, or 'going through a difficult season' of that? I hate it sometimes because it always implies that we are trapped in this invisible space and time where we are constantly waiting for something. It sounds like purgatory. Either I convince myself there isn't any point to being conscious because nothing is going to happen, or I am in the wrong place or the wrong time; the wrong Season, and there is nothing I can do about it. Well, sometimes there isn't. However, recently, I've been thinking that seasons of life aren't so much about the season, or waiting, although it sometimes it, but about changes in perspective and in what I expect.
Just like it is with physical seasons, its tempting when its cold and wet and depressing to think that Summer will never come again or the world can never be warm. I think its the same with emotional and circumstantial seasons. I have thought a lot this year that all the things that were horrible situations could potentially go on forever, or that maybe it was just a season of something. Like, I don't know, misery? We'll call it Winter. The Winter of Life. I was woken up to the fact that maybe I was selling, the season I might see as 'Winter', a little short.
Maybe Winter is in the eye of the beholder, and any 'season' of life can take it's form. What if maybe there is life abundant right here, in the cold and the dark, and I just have to be ok with accepting a life that I haven't planned out or expected. What am I waiting for? If I'm waiting for summer I'll have an awful long wait, like holding your breath underwater until someone pulls the plug on the ocean.
I've realized there is so much beauty to be missed in the world around me, and I've missed it because its not what I expect. I think that I've convinced myself that things won't come until I'm ready for them, and I finally think that its untrue. Maybe the world doesn't revolve around me. Go figure, am I right? Maybe the seasons, both in life and in nature, don't change based on where I am in life, but rather I need to adjust to the world around me. Lets just say that all this time I've been wearing a t-shirt in the middle of a blizzard.
I've started to see myself right where I am, not where I'm going to be; not putting all my expectations on what the 'future me' will be like. I guess a lot of people call this living in the moment. Its always taken me awhile to catch up to these things. This is also not simply just being "content" with all the stupid things in my life that I still hate, but rather focusing on the relevant things that have come around, that are in front of me now, in this moment. My job is to take hold of those opportunities and enjoy them at their proper times without wistfully wishing for something I could never fully appreciate at this time, like enjoying a perennial garden in bloom before it goes back into the frozen ground for another year. This simple fact has really changed how I see things. Its really just made life more fun. The seasons of life seem to be much harder to predict than the seasons of the calendar year, and there are a lot more than 4. But hey, life is only an adventure if you don't know whats coming right?
I've written off so many people and places and sights and sounds because they didn't fit in with the landscape that I had constructed for myself. However, when I started paying attention to the weather and the seasons that were changing without my approval, I realized that I could kill myself with longing for the next season, or I could put on a good coat and really start to live in the real world, with all its amazing circumstance, detail, nuance, and people that it would bring; paying attention to what is happening now.
I'm not going to blame the seasons for changing, because change is such a huge part of what keeps life good, although its hard to keep up sometimes, especially when I get comfortable with how things are. But what I'm starting to see in my 'Winters', and seeing the people who are around me now: it makes me want to try. Try to not to get bogged down in wishing for something else, for some other season, when this is exactly where I'm supposed to be.
I don't think I ever noticed that there were so many amazing things happening right now, in Winter. So often, at random times of the year, I shut down and pack up and figure I should go and hibernate because nothing that I want to happen is happening, and life seems slow. I get caught up in the season of my life. Have you ever heard that phrase? 'Season' of this, or 'going through a difficult season' of that? I hate it sometimes because it always implies that we are trapped in this invisible space and time where we are constantly waiting for something. It sounds like purgatory. Either I convince myself there isn't any point to being conscious because nothing is going to happen, or I am in the wrong place or the wrong time; the wrong Season, and there is nothing I can do about it. Well, sometimes there isn't. However, recently, I've been thinking that seasons of life aren't so much about the season, or waiting, although it sometimes it, but about changes in perspective and in what I expect.
Just like it is with physical seasons, its tempting when its cold and wet and depressing to think that Summer will never come again or the world can never be warm. I think its the same with emotional and circumstantial seasons. I have thought a lot this year that all the things that were horrible situations could potentially go on forever, or that maybe it was just a season of something. Like, I don't know, misery? We'll call it Winter. The Winter of Life. I was woken up to the fact that maybe I was selling, the season I might see as 'Winter', a little short.
Maybe Winter is in the eye of the beholder, and any 'season' of life can take it's form. What if maybe there is life abundant right here, in the cold and the dark, and I just have to be ok with accepting a life that I haven't planned out or expected. What am I waiting for? If I'm waiting for summer I'll have an awful long wait, like holding your breath underwater until someone pulls the plug on the ocean.
I've realized there is so much beauty to be missed in the world around me, and I've missed it because its not what I expect. I think that I've convinced myself that things won't come until I'm ready for them, and I finally think that its untrue. Maybe the world doesn't revolve around me. Go figure, am I right? Maybe the seasons, both in life and in nature, don't change based on where I am in life, but rather I need to adjust to the world around me. Lets just say that all this time I've been wearing a t-shirt in the middle of a blizzard.
I've started to see myself right where I am, not where I'm going to be; not putting all my expectations on what the 'future me' will be like. I guess a lot of people call this living in the moment. Its always taken me awhile to catch up to these things. This is also not simply just being "content" with all the stupid things in my life that I still hate, but rather focusing on the relevant things that have come around, that are in front of me now, in this moment. My job is to take hold of those opportunities and enjoy them at their proper times without wistfully wishing for something I could never fully appreciate at this time, like enjoying a perennial garden in bloom before it goes back into the frozen ground for another year. This simple fact has really changed how I see things. Its really just made life more fun. The seasons of life seem to be much harder to predict than the seasons of the calendar year, and there are a lot more than 4. But hey, life is only an adventure if you don't know whats coming right?
I've written off so many people and places and sights and sounds because they didn't fit in with the landscape that I had constructed for myself. However, when I started paying attention to the weather and the seasons that were changing without my approval, I realized that I could kill myself with longing for the next season, or I could put on a good coat and really start to live in the real world, with all its amazing circumstance, detail, nuance, and people that it would bring; paying attention to what is happening now.
I'm not going to blame the seasons for changing, because change is such a huge part of what keeps life good, although its hard to keep up sometimes, especially when I get comfortable with how things are. But what I'm starting to see in my 'Winters', and seeing the people who are around me now: it makes me want to try. Try to not to get bogged down in wishing for something else, for some other season, when this is exactly where I'm supposed to be.
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