Personal Reflections #1
Slowing Down One More Time
I promised myself that I would begin to author my life by starting each morning, not by looking at my phone or allowing my attention to go to people in my life immediately, but to writing for the first hour.
This particular morning, today, I awoke a little later than I had intended, and got out of sync with myself. Instead of writing immediately, I felt behind and rushed right into responding to others. Someone asked me, “have you written this morning?” Slightly irritated, I say, “No. I will.” The below writing is what came when I decided that I would.
Right now, I’m feeling a sense of pressure — as though I don’t have enough time to answer all of the pressures and responsibilities of life.
As I pause and slow down and really examine that feeling, I realize that that assumption cannot actually be true. If something were truly urgent right now, it would present itself in this moment. I would see it clearly and respond to it. But nothing urgent is presenting itself at this exact moment. If nothing urgent is here, then something very simple must also be true: I have time, and more importantly, I don’t want to be run by a false timeline.
It made me ask a different question: Is it possible that we are living in more than one kind of timeline?
The way I’m beginning to understand it is this: there seems to be a horizontal timeline and a vertical one.
The horizontal timeline is the one most of us move through every day. It stretches outward through tasks, plans, duties, obligations, responsibilities, and expectations. It moves from one thing to the next, always scanning ahead to what must be done next.
And there is also a vertical timeline. The vertical timeline drops directly into the present moment. Instead of moving outward across time, it moves downward into depth and breadth. It is less concerned with what comes next and more concerned with fully inhabiting what is here.
As I write this, I can feel something subtle happening. The act of writing itself is slowing my thinking, and my priorities are rearranging. It feels as though I am moving away from the horizontal timeline and aligning more closely with the vertical one.
I really want to live in the intersections between the two timelines. The horizontal timeline is the physical world where I meet my responsibilities and take deliberate action physically. The vertical world is where I avail myself of my connection to the spiritual world and give myself space to breathe deeply — it helps me to prioritize by physical objectives. It allows space for joy and happiness in what is happening.
Yesterday in my Gyrotonic class, Rhonda was helping me stretch my hamstrings at the hip joint while strengthening my quadriceps at the same time. My hamstrings are pretty tight, and my quads are relatively weak. As we worked together, I noticed that when my hamstrings began to lengthen even slightly, my quadriceps started to shake.
It struck me that something similar happens in the mind.
When my attention lengthens into the present moment — when it truly relaxes into what is happening right now — other systems begin to activate and organize themselves naturally. My body responds as my breath becomes deeper and my mind becomes clearer.
It’s remarkable to me because the slight micro-movements leave me with a surprising muscle soreness the next day. I’m beginning to see that I serve myself best when I focus completely on what I am doing in the present moment. Set the intention. Follow through. Do the task that is here. And gently refuse to let the mind wander into imagined pressures that have not yet arrived.
I can see that when I stay with what is actually happening, I have more space for the unexpected. I can naturally breathe more deeply, and my mind is clearer.
So, perhaps the place we are meant to live is right at that intersection — where life continues moving forward, but we remain present enough to breathe. Maybe this will reduce the excess cortisol flooding in my body, and will help me lose weight?
Just something I noticed today…