– Photo by Jan Ketchel
Here is this week’s channeled message. Time to get down to it and start a new spiritual practice. You need it, the world needs it. There is no time like now!
Tag Archives: routine
A Day in a Life: The Rails Of Routine
– Photo by Jan Ketchel
Routine, both a beauty and a beast, keeps us on the straight and narrow. Even if we are not train commuters, riding the rails each morning and back again each evening, our lives can become as rigid and narrowly defined as the rails upon which the commuter trains rumble along, heading always in the same two directions, in and out of the city.
The beauty of routine is that it keeps us sane. It occupies us for most of the day with all that holds us bound to life, to work, to duty, to the security and safety of all that is and all that we expect to continue to be. It invites us to easily get up each day and go about our lives with little thought to anything else.
Routine offers the beauty of knowing who we are and where we are, at least for the moment and perhaps even for the foreseeable future. Routine allows us to exist without fear or worry, as we merrily ride along on its rails of contentment. But routine is also a beast. It confines us to that same life of contentment, which leads to complacency. It allows us to dissociate as we let life pass us by, as we are not challenged to do otherwise. It takes us where it always takes us, with little room for adventure. It controls our lives and keeps our spirits dampened with its must dos and must haves. In truth, it limits us.
The control of routine goes far beyond our outer world, controlling our inner world as well. Think of the routine things we say to ourselves all the time, the repetitive thoughts that circulate through our minds telling us the same things about ourselves over and over again, the nagging and debilitating untruths that constantly keep us stuck on the rigid rails of unfulfilling life.
Rigid ideas, judgments, expectations, and choices keep us stuck, keep us narcissistically fixated on always being right and always being safe in our routine. We can’t hear anything outside of our inner patter and we can’t accept that someone else might have something important to tell us, offering a new perspective. If we are always right then everyone else must be wrong, and that’s a really hard way to live. In breaking through the rigidities of our inner routine, we offer ourselves the opportunity to hear, see, and experience something new.
– Photo by Jan Ketchel
We recently took a week off from our routine. It was to be a week to flow with the energy of each day, seeing what arose to guide us, to entice us, to invite us into new experiences or to simply be. It was a wonderful experience; no pressure, no duty, no expectations. We woke each morning to a bubble of excitement. What will we do today? And then we waited. We waited for signs and for our mutual energy in alignment to guide us. It worked perfectly.
Some days we were active, other days we were calmly present, but always we acted from a place of knowing that there was no agenda and thus there was no compromise. Adventures presented themselves and we enjoyed them. Challenges arose and we met them. Nothing was denied; everything was acceptable. We noticed that the conscious shift away from routine did not mean there was no routine, but it meant that routine did not rule, it became a choice. It became simply a structure to engage in or not.
We let the energy of each day determine our actions along with our own sense of what felt right. We sat with feelings, emotions, desires and the energy of our physical selves and made our decisions based on sitting in calmness. Reading the energy of each day and the reality of where we were in the moment made for some interesting choices in how to use the freedom of no routine. Rather than run around like crazy with our freedom, no agenda gave us pause to investigate ourselves on a deeper level. What was most important to us? Sitting in calmness the answers came clearly. Sitting in calmness the world and its enticements dissolved.
In the midst of our week off we decided that we should break with some of our routine schedules. You may notice that our blogging schedule is going to be different, when inspiration strikes, rather than according to a plan we had set up years ago. This allows us to be more present in the moment, more spontaneous, and more in alignment with the energy of each day.
Channelings may appear more often as we deepen our exploration of all that is, both in the reality of our lives and in the exploration of other realities. We’re excited about this and our main intent is, as it has always been with this website, to freely share what we learn.
including a glimpse of my own shadow…
– Photo by Jan Ketchel
I chose to alter my own morning routine today. I spent some time in the garden. The weather was perfectly calm, the temperature perfectly comfortable, a high summer morning, the bees buzzing, the butterflies on the butterfly bush, the flowers in the garden nodding as I trimmed and admired them. Had I not altered my morning I would not have been available to rescue a fat chipmunk caught in a downspout, his mouth full of nuts. I heard something scrambling and when I poked the side of the spout I heard a petrified squeak. I disconnected the gutter and shook it. Out popped a stunned chipmunk, round and plump. He looked at me and then ran off. I gladly accepted that he was grateful for my assistance.
In volitionally changing our routines, we offer ourselves brief moments of respite from our usual feelings and patterns of behavior. We allow ourselves to just be, and when we let ourselves just be we soften. Softening allows us to feel and see things differently too, and those are the moments when new things begin to happen for us and to us. In moments of softness guidance comes, as we are more receptive, and when we are more receptive we are more naturally present to give as well.
In admiration of both the beauty and the beast,
Jan
A Day in a Life: Waiting In The Void
It’s Tuesday afternoon. I’m waiting for the proof of my book to arrive. It’s been a tense few days. I’d sent the book off at 3:45 last Thursday, declaring that I was ready to take a few days off while I waited for the proofs to be delivered by CreateSpace, Amazon’s on-demand publisher. With knowledge of Word and a techie friend who can design a cover, it’s fairly simple to publish a book these days. A few simple downloads and the book was on its way to the great digital reviewer in the cloud. A great sigh of relief and a lot of self-congratualtory pats on the back followed. I smiled a lot and felt very happy.
I decided I’d take a few days off, while I waited for the proof to arrive. I’ll do something else for a while, something else besides writing and thinking about writing, I thought, things I’d been putting off, like cleaning the bathroom and raking the leaves out of the flowerbeds and vegetable garden so I can get my planting done.
Friday, the first day off, and the weekend went by fairly quickly. The weather was nice and so Chuck and I got a lot of outdoor work done. Then Monday arrived and all of a sudden I felt groundless. After obligations were fulfilled, my usual writing time arrived and I didn’t know what to do. The allure of freedom from writing had worn off, but I felt like I had to uphold my intent to give myself a break.
Here it is Tuesday, and I’m still wandering around in the void of free time and so I’m writing this blog just to reground myself. It has to be done anyway, but on the other hand all of this wandering in the void that I’ve created gives me the opportunity to write about routine, how grounding it is, how safe it makes us feel, how important it is to who we are. Without it, I feel like a ship out of water!
When I was a full time freelance artist, I dreaded the lull between jobs. Not only was it financially stressful but I feared that I’d lose my creativity completely in those down times. I worried that I’d be unable to come up with an idea when the next job proposal came along. And so I’d keep multiple projects always going, making sure there was always an overlap so I’d never lose my creative edge. And so I never had free time either, or very little of it. I was always working in some way, keeping myself safe, because free time in the old days meant fears would seep in. It meant risking deeper depression and darker moods than normal, states that were very difficult to extricate myself from. I’m in a totally different place these days, in fact, I’m a totally different person. But I look back on the person I was with such fondness, for her ability to deal with the tension of living on the precipice of despair was impeccable.
These days, I’m a stranger to depression. It’s rare now, and so fear of depression wasn’t an issue as I faced the past few days. I didn’t worry about discipline either, for I am a very disciplined person. You can’t be a freelancer and not have discipline; your livelihood is totally in your own hands. Discipline however, involves routine, and so I come to this self-realization: I love routine! It’s so predictable. It makes life flow. It makes life so easy. I will do this and this and this, and then that will happen and that. What could be easier! But what could be more boring!
And so I face this boring truth about myself, while at the same time I look into the void of my empty writing time. I must fill it with something else! NO! I won’t. But then here I am, filling it. As I sit at my computer and write, I have to admit that my sense of groundlessness has dissipated. The void is fast receding, and yet I refuse to see this as routine—not me!
Yes, Jan, it is. I’m not letting myself sit in the lull that I’ve created by my intent to not do the routine. I’m not letting myself sit in the calm, in the moment of silence when the mind is still. When in the busyness of my routine I long for such moments. I long for the long meditation period, the calmness of a quiet day with nothing to do. I feel like I’m away on vacation and after two days I’m done, I’ve had enough. It’s time to leave. But I’m too far from home, committed, the vacation paid for and so I must stay. At times like these the challenge really is to let go, to push through the urge to jump up and go back to work and let the lull become important, sacred, and nurturing. We all need respite.
I can so easily lose sight of such basic human needs for rest and relaxation in the energy of the creative. And I think that’s what I’m dealing with right now, the energy of the creative, because although I didn’t consciously make certain that I had something to fill the gap while I wait for the proofs to arrive, my creative self stepped in and took over. Her old spot opened up and she grabbed the opportunity to reassert her priorities. Creativity runs deep, and so I acquiesce—for a little while. I realize that for some people having the free time to be creative is such a dream, while those of us who live it our whole lives might need a break from it every now and then, from the consuming fire of it. Just a little break.
Writing this blog doesn’t feel routine. I’m “not doing,” as the Shamans of Ancient Mexico say—breaking the routine by doing things differently, or not at all—by writing on a different day than usual, and when I’m done I’m going to do something quiet, in alignment with my spirit asking for some attention. It’s time to reenter the void. Hmm, I’ve been yearning to learn a new song on the ukelele…
Just taking a small break from my beloved routine,
Jan
P.S. It looks like my book, The Edge of the Abyss – Volume 1, will be ready for ordering by the end of the week. I look forward to being able to post that announcement! Feel free to write reviews at Amazon and spread the word in other ways, if you feel that it’s right. One must be an Amazon customer to leave a review on the book page, I believe. I personally have such a hard time saying that I hope you’ll like the book knowing that it’s about such a difficult subject, but I really do hope you’ll all like it!