Posted by on Oct 30, 2013 in selfish, spirituality, Uncategorized, writing, Yes | 8 comments

 

We all have something we love to do. But for whatever reason, we aren’t making the time. Other things seem more important. We neglect to schedule it in. We put it off until someday.

But if we want to do this thing that fills our heart, we have to make the time.

It has to be a habit, a routine, a regular part of our daily life.

Routines become mundane. Often, the word habit has a negative connotation. We tend to break habits, think of bad habits.

So why not, instead, create an habitual ritual.

A ritual is sacred. Important. Meaningful.

Like walking the dogs. Feeding the birds. Drinking your morning cup of coffee. An habitual ritual happens at a set time every day. Not every other day. Or once a week. But every day. Even if something else seems more important.

Nothing is more important.

You’ve learned this by NOT showing up. By talking yourself into other things, out of THIS thing. But then, you feel a hole in your heart, and food can’t fill it. Sleep can’t fill it. Not even dog kisses can fill it.

Only doing what you truly love can fill it.

It could be painting. Or exercising. Or learning a new language.

For me, it is writing.

How words miraculously appear on blank paper, flowing out from the end of my hand as if by magic. Sometimes they are boring, simple, repeating rhymes that any five year old could write.

But when I stay with it, a sentence forms, an image appears and a story unfolds like a fancy napkin in my lap and I just watch it, breathe it, follow it. Without censoring, without spell check, just allowing the words to lead and flow and color the page and I realize that it’s not a hole in my heart at all, but a filling, an overfilling, an overflowing and THIS is what I have been missing. This is what I have been aching for. THIS is why I write.

And so, even on the days when all I can write are silly rhymes and simple descriptions of tall trees and a sky that is only blue, I must make it a habitual ritual to show up. Because I want to write.

How do you create an habitual ritual?

You show up. At the same time everyday. Every Day. And you remember how much you want it. You come back to the WHY of doing this thing in the first place.

You honor the time, you honor yourself. You honor this thing you are setting out to do.

You pick up your paint brush, or put on your running shoes, or poise your finger pads over the grooves of the keyboard and you begin.

And the next day you begin again.

Create the ritual.

Become the ritual.

Because it’s the only way to your heart.

 

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