This morning I had a plan. It wasn’t anything extraordinary, but it felt good to have a plan nonetheless. The last couple months have been very difficult for me. Several family members have been sick, one of those being my eighty-six-year-old grandmother, and just when I think there might a moment to breathe, something else happens. Life. I guess. I get a flat tire and have to replace all the tires. An appliance goes out. Something bad happens to a friend. It’s really no harder than anyone else’s life, and is a lot easier than many others. Some things are little, some are huge and all-consuming. So I don’t let myself think too hard about any of it very often. I try not to make plans. But I did this morning, because the day seemed open.

My plan was to go for a run at a park near my yoga studio, then finish in time to go to a yoga class. Simple, really, quite the Ladies Who Lunch style of day, right? It did feel a little luxurious to plan that. Partly because anything looking nice and normal just feels weird and foreign right now. Nothing is the same as it was before, so doing what I used to do all the time doesn’t exactly feel right.

I get to the park, I take a drink of water, I put on my sunglasses, I make sure I have some sunscreen, I step out of the car, I lock my keys in said car. Of course I do. Along with my phone, wallet, everything. I roll my eyes. I am not even surprised. How can I be? So I turn around and look for people, people that might have cell phones. Instead I turn around and I see a group of men that, although I am not certain, I am not about to ask if they have cell phones.

Cell phones? Thinking no.

I see another man getting into a car so I run over to him (people like that, right? Being bum-rushed by strangers?) and he lets me use his phone. Then he leaves, and it is just me and the monks. They are walking around, taking pictures (with actual cameras, not phones), enjoying the scenery. I go for a short walk, not wanting to miss my rescue, and return and, still, it’s just me and the monks. This isn’t the first time I’ve ever seen a monk, and I know that many like to visit here in Colorado probably for some of the same reasons I love living here. But I have no idea what to say to them. Of course some people are thinking Well, you don’t have to say anything, idiot, but I did because it was just me and the monks and something felt kind of special about that. Because it could have just been me alone, or me and some tourists, or me in my life six months ago before anyone knew anything was going to start getting harder and scary.

But no, it was me and the monks there now. So I said “good morning” as I walked by to go to the water fountain. And the monks all said good morning back to me. As if they’d done that before. As if it was normal. And I smiled because if I had to lock my keys in the car, I then felt I did it at the right place and time. I sat down to wait, and the monks sat with me. I didn’t really know why, because I wasn’t crying or in a panic or otherwise hysterical, and I really didn’t think they knew what I’d done. I was just sitting, waiting, and they sat too. Me on the curb, some on the curb near me, some on the sidewalk, some leaning on a split-rail fence. I was surrounded by monks. They talked to each other, laughed a lot, and I pretty much just allowed myself to steal all of their monk energy. I breathed, I watched the sun come up further and further over the rocks, and I just sat, listening to them and imagining what they might be talking about. A couple of times I thought of saying something, but it felt right to do nothing more than be there.

I didn’t ask them any questions, they didn’t ask me any questions. It was the first time in weeks and weeks when the people surrounding me weren’t also people going through pain, change, and heartache. It was the first time in weeks I felt I could simply sit and not feel anything.

After sitting about a half hour, my rescue arrived. I stood up, turned and smiled to what felt like my new posse, and walked over to my car. I looked back across the parking lot and they all had begun to pile into two minivans and make their way out of the park. It was time for them to move on with their day, with their plans. They had no reason to stay there, no reason but me. Knowing that makes me feel like I can make it a little longer. And if I feel I can’t, I will just have to close my eyes and imagine my little monk posse surrounding me again.

We’re all just walking each other home. -Anne Lamott.

After mentioning meditation in my last post, something kind of strange happened. It has come up again and again in my every day life. Between people who I know read the post, and people who I’m certain did not. I have talked about it a lot, which has made me think about it a lot. And analyze it a little, which is my life-long go-to reaction to anything. Got a small issue? Analyze it and make it big. Random, unimportant thing cross your mind? Start thinking about it and let it consume you. Anyway, in this case my analysis is not a bad thing, at least not yet.

I am no expert on meditation. In fact, if someone asked me to give them a proper definition, I couldn’t. I would say something like “stillness and quieting your mind and blah blah, don’t pressure me!” I have not done all the book research I could do. And I think that’s fine. I think when it comes to doing things for yourself, to improve yourself or let yourself grow, pacing yourself is a priority. Often getting used to the idea of something in our minds is the only battle. Like flossing. If we’re trying to become a regular flosser, it’s not the act of flossing that we dread, it’s adapting the habit in our minds. It’s everything leading up to that moment of the action that is really the problem. Our minds really can kill something, or explode something that, when it comes down to it, is stunningly simple.

Which is what I’ve realized over the past few days when talking with people about meditation: It has helped me to realize that you are not your mind. That is a heck of a concept, at least for me. I believe in education and knowledge creating power and using all you have in you to become your best, so saying you are not all that’s contained in your mind is super hard for me. I have a much easier time accepting and believing that we are not our physical selves, but not being our minds? This thing I’ve worked so hard to become? That is hard.

But at some point, it did dawn on me. Personally, I do believe that I am a spiritual being. I believe I was created as one, pure soul and I believe that about everyone else, too. I believe all our roads really do lead to Rome, as they say, and therefore whatever is contained in our brain is not the whole of us. This applies to the great stuff, and to the struggles. To the brilliant light bulb moments, and to the imperfections. The mistakes and the illusions.

When I think of it this way, that I am not defined by the bad habits I’ve had, by the stories I tell myself about my own worth, I start to feel free. Little by little, the more time I spend being still, in quiet, the less tight my grip on all the hardships of my mind becomes. For example, I used to weigh about twenty pounds more than I do now. I would tell myself these stories about how I’d feel if I lost weight. Then, I stopped trying to lose weight and lost it and you know what? I still find a way to tell myself the same stories. They are not necessarily about weight, but they are about me. They’re something about my appearance or what I see when I think of myself, and they continued. Same book, new cover. And the more I’ve realized that what I tell myself under the layer of all the positive stuff is just as heavy. It’s that under-layer of my mind that really kicks in when I don’t realize it.

Taking time for meditation has helped me separate myself from that a bit. All along I have believed in my spiritual self, as well as my intellectual self, but never did I really take the time to untie them. U-N-T-I-E. To see myself not by how I measure up or my actions or words, but as starting out as simply as everyone else. We are not our minds. We are not the stories we tell ourselves. We are not our past thoughts, or even our current thoughts. We are not our titles or mistakes or accomplishments. It doesn’t mean these things cannot be significant, but they are not what makes us deserving of our lives. In fact, I think at the level at which we don’t define ourselves by what is in our head is the level at which we can easiest believe we are most deserving.

I’m practicing believing that more.

Throughout the last month, I’ve read quite a few posts about people revisiting their 2012 goals. Each time I read these I think, hmm, I should do that. But that’s kind of a goal in itself, isn’t it? Finding time to take stock. Ugh. Living is hard. Anyway, it is April now, after all, so before the entire year gets away I decided to finally take a minute and think about the things I wanted to focus on this year.

To save time, and because I’ve had them taped to the bottom edge of my monitor since January, here’s my list.

1. Be still, purposefully. I wanted to take the time to pause, to appreciate, to pray beforehand. Before I got into the overwhelming thick of it.

2. Love others as myself. Particularly, the difficult people. It’s easy to love the saints.

3. Gratitude as if this is as good as life can possibly get. Even if it keeps getting better, I wanted less expectation in my appreciation.

Being still hasn’t come easy to me. I mean, duh, of course it has not. But trying to? That has become more easy. The yoga studio I go to has weekly mediation classes. Not as in mediation during your practice, but a class solely focused on mediation. I have been attending for at least six months now, but I think it’s purpose is finally sinking in. I do think of yoga as a spiritual thing for me. Not a religious thing, but spiritual for sure as I tend to think of my entire life and every thought or action within this context. There’s always meaning for me, is what I’m saying. So. I say this all because people tend to think that meditation is about belief and religion. It is not, necessarily. It may be for you, which is nice for you, but it’s not the foundation. All of this to say that I think this meditation class has revealed to me that some other paths of belief might do a better job of teaching us how to forge and follow our own paths than what our own paths my have taught us. That is confusing.

What I really mean is that I feel like I’m finally learning to be still and really think about what I’m thinking, what I’m living, to the point where I don’t have to think about it at all. I get to simply be with it, albeit usually briefly. In the last few weeks I have begun adding meditation (or sitting quietly and trying not to be annoyed by it, every day is different) to most of my days and it’s going well. This isn’t to say it’s easy, but I think I can feel myself becoming closer to myself, to my being, and to my God. I don’t know if this is the point, but I do know that the point has got to be different for everyone, so I’d say it is working. For me. For now. I’m enjoying trying.

Loving others as myself hasn’t been a piece of cake, either. Goals aren’t easy, right? That’s why they’re goals– if they were easy we’d already be doing them, I guess. And, of course, just as I was feeling pretty at peace with my neighbors, a new pair has moved in a few doors down with a new pair of dogs and none of the four of them feel compelled to pick up after themselves. I can forgive the dogs– no opposable thumbs, no access to plastic bags, etc. I am having a much harder time forgiving the people. This seems to be my life’s metaphor: misplaced dog poo. Of course, I am like many others and can get annoyed by people and even dislike them in all kinds of settings. But there’s something about a person lacking the urge to pick up the poo of their own dog that sends me over the edge.

I immediately dislike them, I give them no benefit of the doubt, and I begin making assumptions about the rest of their life. I am super cool like that, if cool = jerk. I don’t know why this is such a sticking point for me, but I want to overcome it somehow. I feel like even if I excel at loving others is all other areas of my life, if I can’t somehow find some compassion for this neighbor that cannot clean up after their dog that I am falling short. I know how this sounds, because no one likes dog poo. Why should I like them? Why should I care? Why would anyone watch another person leave crap in your yard and feel good about it? But that’s not what I want. I don’t want to feel good about the poo, I just don’t want to have such a firey dislike for the person. I think that’s possible. I’m still working on it, though.

And gratitude in this moment, well, that has been both easy and difficult. I have my moments. I have times when I look around and think WOW. That is probably my most common thought, I am easily entertained impressed with life, I’ll admit it. It’s a great feeling. But. (Of course.) I also have a struggle, because I’ve chosen a life in which I cannot see the future like I once could. Or, like I thought I once could. Like the illusion I once lived wherein I thought I could see the future. You understand. Probably.

What I mean is, I used to be able to sit at a computer on April 2 and plan for October. I felt very comfortable doing that. And aside from the proverbial bus that might hit me, I didn’t see obstacles. Now, it’s not so easy. While there is also the proverbial bus, always, there are a lot of smaller hazards too. And I’m not so good at navigating them yet. Which is part of this goal, to be grateful for this time, not just because I don’t know what the next moment holds, but because I will never know. Part of me is scared of not knowing, part of me is scared of being 100% right and knowing the best is yet to be. Either way, I don’t want to speed through time not being grateful for now. Now is pretty good. I have not seen a bus in a while.

So, a quarter through this year, I’m pretty content with my goals. It is not all going perfectly, because it never could, but I’m not forgetting about them. I’m enjoying trying. For the most part.

A week ago today I was feeling under the weather, still not recovered from the cold I thought I’d had the week before. Then, Tuesday, I felt a whole lot worse. It didn’t occur to me until Wednesday, when I couldn’t get out of bed much less shake the fever and pounding headache that had set in that I was, perhaps, not getting over anything but rather in the midst of the flu. As someone who rarely get sick, it didn’t occur to me that I had the flu until, well, I had the flu. And I don’t have to tell you how bad it sucked or how bad I wanted my mommy.

While there was exactly no thought beyond when I could take my next dose of medicine and sleep again, I have finally been able to recover in the last few days. I am still in a bit of disbelief that I was that sick, if only because of how fortunate I have been in the past to generally avoid it. Which must be why I didn’t think I was dealing with the flu until I was in the middle of it. The worst part of it.

That has me thinking this morning about how often I can be susceptible to that same behavior. Often I don’t realize what something is until it’s already upon me. That it’s great or terrible or challenging until I’m already in the midst of living it. And then, even more so, as I’m able to look back on it. It may sound a little silly comparing life events to a virus, but it’s especially helpful to me right now to think this way. It seems like life is only getting harder. It seems we’re all really having to try harder, think harder, and be even more forgiving and loving than ever.

Wiser, more experienced people would probably say that, yes, it is true but only because you’re now living it. You’ve now come far enough in life and took time enough for reflection to see that it really is quite difficult to make the choices that seemed to come so easily in the past. And that you may not realize it until it is upon you.

This is a hard time for me this… time period. It’s a place I’ve led myself, but that doesn’t make it any less difficult. Or maybe it makes it more so. But regardless, I didn’t see this time coming, and even as I walked into it and as I walk through it, I have trouble seeing it for what it is. Rather than focusing on what I don’t see unfolding, I want to try better to make obvious what is really coming of this struggle. And I want that to  be enough. I want surviving to be enough. I want being a good friend and sister and daughter and granddaughter and niece and cousin and aunt and neighbor to be enough. I want doing good work, working in my community, and doing what I can and giving all I can right now to be enough. I want to know that when I paused and thought there was no more to give and then, wow, found a little more, it was just the right amount needed from me. I want to know that right now, this that is upon me, is also special.

It’s hard to do that. It’s hard to look at something that isn’t your dream and doesn’t seem to be on the way to your dream as special. But when it comes down to it, I don’t believe there are mistakes. I don’t believe there are random or misplaced moments in time that aren’t meant to happen. We know what is by choosing to accept it, to live it. It is real.

This is what is upon me now. It is significant. It is enough.

I didn’t really know who I was, physically, in college. I mean, I didn’t really know who I was for the most part in college, but as an exerciser (person who exercises?), I knew even less. I knew I liked it, but that’s about it. While not sedentary, I wasn’t a super star athlete in high school, and mostly I just really liked doing something. I liked moving. I also had no motivation from my body as, you know, I didn’t eat to remain or not remain a certain way. I didn’t think about it in the same way. (Don’t worry, I still found plenty of time to say mean things to myself about my body, things it would take me years to overcome, I just didn’t so much connect that to Big Macs, is what I’m saying.)

I did physical exercise for fun. And that kind of continued in college, in a less organized way. I went to lots of aerobics classes (shut up, step aerobics was huge in ‘99, people), and I’d go for a sporadic run every now and then. I liked doing stuff. It wasn’t until I was out of college until I figured out how much I needed it. Which is when I started running. I was twenty-two years old.

Last month, February, which marked itself with several other events that don’t need to be revisited, was also the ten year anniversary of when I started regularly running. It was my Runniversary.

I don’t know if it’s because I’m only 32 (eye roll), but having committed to something and it making me both continually happy and crazy and thrilled and grateful for the course of a decade seems pretty huge. There are few other things in life I’ve loved this long, and suffice it to say no other things that are not living things, that I have found such a home in. It feels really good to celebrate that, if only in my heart.

Today, the first week of March, it is 65F degrees here in Colorado. I went out for a run before a noon yoga class and took some time to think about what the last ten years have been like, and how this one constant thing I do all on my own has brought me so much. Friends, travel, relationships, solace, peace, worn out treadmill belts, love, frustration, time, pain, joy, fun– it has all been there, wrapped up in countless pairs of shoes and miles I’ve never really been good at keeping track of. I have done short races, some longer races, relays and been on teams. I have medals and photos and more wonderful memories than I deserve. I have not only called myself a runner but have been doing it long enough to be able to realize what an incredible gift that is.

It has been a good ten years and I am so grateful. I hope I get ten more.

I think there are blocks of time in life that appear more significant than others. Some are very obvious, like accomplishments, surviving something painful, arriving at something joyful, making a big decision. Transitions.

It’s easy for us to talk about these things, because they cannot be ignored. They demand to be lived. And so we talk about them, or celebrate them, or collaborate over their dreadfulness, or all of that. I think that’s important. I think the Internet has made that even more important, and has saved so very many people from feeling alone in their experience. I know it has helped me.

I think there is something less talked about, though. The After. That period of time that falls after the huge event, after the story has gotten exciting or thrilling or threatened. The time when things settle again. Briefly, this time can recharge. “I have my life back” we say, but only briefly. Because something I have learned about pushing through is that we are not naturally meant to settle. Yes, many of us do, for a lot of good reasons. Or, some of us are more patient, more content to wait. But even in that, our mind is not naturally made to pause. Outwardly it may appear we’re paused while on the inside we’re anticipating, planning, hoping.

The natural breath in the moment between impact and settling is relatively short, and whatever the impact was becomes old news. Often it brings the gift of hindsight, of gratitude, of lessons, yes, but we’re not meant to live in between. And so we feel the urge to move. Even if we are afraid, even if we resist, the urge is still there, half curse and half blessing.

The last year or so of my life has been about moving out of that between breath. The excitement and stress and fear and hope of changing my life has faded now. The uncertainty is still very present, but it has become easier to live with. It is more like a tolerable roommate than a stinky house guest. I don’t love it, but it’s not getting any worse either. I have changed in a lot of ways, I have become healthier, more grateful, and more kind.

I have learned a lot of patience in this time, I have grown to know it better. It is not the tolerable roommate that uncertainty is, but it’s an only semi-annoying neighbor. Which is why it’s hard to simultaneously deal with that urge I mentioned earlier. Because it’s naturally there, demanding I move. It’s demanding I keep becoming, keep working toward a future that barely has a shape.

I guess I’m in a transition of another kind now. I’m being pushed out of the comfort of having done something big and life changing and now I need to look forward again. I can’t be consumed by the moment any more, as this moment is fading. It’s another transition, it’s just this time I have no idea what it looks like. But, a couple years ago I wouldn’t have described quitting a job as a place of comfort, either. So I have hope.

I believe we are only given what we can handle. I believe that in the face of challenges, loss, and the last couple months of my life. I also think handle is sometimes categorized as quiet, as definitively graceful, and nothing else. Handling isn’t messy. Handling isn’t a process. It is supposed to be smooth and quick and not bothersome.

The opposite of life, really.

Because life is bumpy. Life’s years go quickly by way of some really long days. Life annoys the living. Life is a damn mess. Which is why handling is often such a delicate, underrated, misinterpreted idea. One way I handled my feelings last week was to express them here. I got really great support and feedback from that. I got really great reinforcement and encouragement in naming what was going on, in expressing it simply for the purpose of expressing it. I also got reminded that the Internet is still a small world and people play some pretty wicked games out there. Someone actually emailed me encouraging me to compare my problems and how I handle them to, no, not theirs, but a third party. Can you imagine?

People. There is no award for She Who Suffers Most. Stop it. Stop having some idea that you can play this At Least game (you know: Well, I might have done X but she did Y, which is much worse) and win. That is not a winning game. There is no award for basking in someone’s pain, or for standing on someone’s pile of crap to raise yourself. There is no triumph in pointing out the obvious.

I read and reread that email. I tried to understand. I wanted to try to feel what this person was feeling, to understand why they were moved to write to me like that. I couldn’t feel it. Maybe I am just so broken down lately that feeling that was asking far too much of myself, but I couldn’t muster it. I didn’t have the energy to compare my pain and struggle to anyone’s. And I’m glad I didn’t.

When you’re in the thick of a mess and just trying to get by, you find yourself constantly searching for life rafts. Sometimes you might even see them when they aren’t there. Sometimes you may see something to hold onto that will only end up bringing you down. It’s hard not to grab that thing. I have spent the last couple days just feeling grateful I didn’t grab that thing, glad that I was so weak that I couldn’t. So glad that in that weakness I was still somehow allowed to see I can trust myself and my way of handling my life.

Yes, my handling is messy. It is a bumpy road that loops around and doubles back with a flat tire and a low fuel gauge. It is not quick. But at the end of the day I trust it. I trust my life raft. Not because I have the hardest road out there, not because I am She Who Suffers Most, but because I am amongst all of the other sufferers. I know that when we share in glory and reward it is also because we share in challenge and pain. And when I look around at all our piles of crap, how different they are and how differently we’re handling them, the view is somehow also incredibly level.

I have tried to hold it together. Over the last six weeks I have had moments of being really down but have been able to pull myself back onto my path, some path, because I’d tell myself it was the right thing to do. I have told myself that this hard time, and what I’m feeling, is inevitable. Deserved, almost, because I’ve made choices and sometimes things are hard and that is what happens. Not a punishment, but a time to learn for sure. And I get through these times, because I am nothing if not stable. “The Stable One.” Then it passes.

And I’ve tried to resist feeling sorry for myself, because being sad and unable to deal with certain realities is not all that bad or uncommon. I read a story about someone else’s life and know for sure that it is just the perspective I need. Or, I even offer some encouraging words, which are true and from my heart, and that makes me feel better. I know I am not alone, and that’s where I take some solace.

The thing is, it’s becoming a pile-up around here. Thing after thing, with no breather. Relationship over. Family struggling. Work challenges. Work lost. Friend in poor health. Best friend moving away. Less concentration. More stress. Less money. Less planning for the future. Being over-looked for invites. More alone time. Less wanting to be alone. Car making a terrible sound. Appliance breaking. Dreams slipping. Wishing I was closer with the people I once was. Not feeling capable enough of handling any of it.

I can’t see the big picture right now. I can’t see holding it together, or why I would. I can’t see pushing through because I no longer feel like I know what I’m pushing for. This is not to say I’m feeling hopeless, and this is not to say there still aren’t important things in my life. I will always feel right about being there for the things that matter. But today I guess I just needed to admit that something is broken. Or maybe, more likely, I am broken.

I hope that getting this out helps, and that my next step will be making a list of everything that is going right.

Seven years ago, when I first started writing this blog, my first post was about having just had Lasik eye surgery. I had plans to snorkel on an upcoming vacation and was thrilled about being able to see the fish.

Everyone will tell you that at some point after you have Lasik surgery, your eyes will once again need some kind of correction. Although I sense nothing now and still see very clearly, I think about that. What an inconvenience glasses or contacts will seem like after what will likely be a decade or more of not needing them.

And while inconvenience is relative, I began wearing glasses and contacts at the age of fifteen. The annoyance of preparation and planning ahead as a teenager and young adult sticks in my head. But more so, when I think about this potential inconvenience coming for me now, I remember how freaking adaptable I was then.

In fact, I had squinted at the chalkboard (yes, classrooms still had chalkboards when granny was in school, youngins) for a while never realizing it was so bad until one day a friend next to me took off her glasses and set them on her desk. I picked them up and put them on, who knows why (” God! Who knows why teenagers do anything!”- my mother/all mothers probably), and realized that, no, not all the letters appeared to have fur growing around them. They were quite clear, actually. Somehow I’d passed eye exams and never bothered to question all the… fuzziness.

So I ran home that day and told my mother I needed glasses immediately. And contacts. For sports, you know. All the sports I tried but was never really good at but still sat there anyway acting like it was a damn good time, smiling like an idiot. And let me tell you, it is a damn good time when you can see clearly what is and isn’t flying directly at your face.

(Aside: Also, after I got glasses, the first thing I did was look at the mountains. You see, I live a stone’s throw from the mountains. I could look out the window right now and see the individual tree tops on the mountains, which are just a few miles away. But before I had glasses, I still saw the mountains but not the detail. Not the tree tops, you guys. So when I saw that for the first time in who knows how long, it was like, WHAT? TREE TOPS? SO THIS IS WHAT YOU GUYS SEE EVERY DAY? WHAT THE HELL?! It was an emotional moment.)

But I never knew what I was really missing. I just adapted. I had a perfectly fine time being fifteen (well, you know, with impossible hormones and emotions and ALL THE PROBLEMS). Me and my fuzzy letters were relatively fine. So when I think about that now, about how I’d just adapted without really thinking about it, I am kind of amazed. We hear it all the time, how kids are adaptable, flexible, quick to accept.

It makes me miss being that way.

I miss adapting without having to think about it. Because I think of all the things that happen now, how the thought of once again needing glasses or contacts again annoys me, and how, of course, I’d get used to it, but I’d have to think about it. I’d have to consciously practice adapting to a new way of life rather than just doing what’s necessary.

It makes me want to be better. If it is a product of age, being annoyed, fine. I can handle that. But instead of dwelling there, can I just move forward? Can I adapt? Can I act as if there is nothing I can do about the truth because, well, there actually isn’t? I want to. I want to think like that kid with 20/100 vision before she knew she had 20/100 vision.

Here’s to being more blind to what’s hard, and moving forward in spite of it.

In my bathroom there is a small little shelf that can really only be seen from one angle where I store a couple spare rolls of toilet paper. (I promise this post isn’t about the bathroom or toilet.) I remember when I was out of college and in my first apartment and always stocked up on toilet paper and how adult that felt– to never run out of essentials. Planning ahead is so… mature?

Since that time, I have just become one of those people who keeps things stocked. I don’t want to wrestle the tube of toothpaste pretending it isn’t all gone because I did not buy any at the store. I want to use all the toothpaste completely (see also: my Depression Era way of using/eating/drinking everything until it’s totally gone) and then go to the closet for another tube. It is incredible the stress you can eliminate from your life by thinking ahead a step or two, right?

While I still appreciate that I have spares of all the things I need within reach, lately I look at that little shelf by the toilet with those spare rolls of toilet paper and it says abundance to me. It shouts ABUNDANCE. I am a bit of a worrier, this I think we know, so when I look at those spare rolls and know I do not have to worry about running out at this time, a calm feeling of abundance washes over me. I am reassured with how lucky I am, how special it really is to have a basic need accounted for, when even most of the world wouldn’t even consider it a basic need.

I am so blessed.

And it reminds me to look and be grateful for abundance in other places in my life. I get so overcome sometimes with how different my life looks today than anything I would’ve imagined that I don’t see that more often than not, that is a good thing. While the things I choose to keep in the forefront of my mind aren’t what I thought, there is a much harsher reality out there that I don’t live, either. I am in a good place. I am surrounded by abundance. My hygienic needs are well provided for.

Amen.