For many of us, it’s holiday time of year. That time when we stop doing what we are doing on a daily basis and take time to renew, refresh and replenish our minds, bodies and spirits.
So much of our time can be taken up with fulfilling other people’s expectations of us – as fathers, mothers, brothers, sisters, sons, daughters, carers, employers or employees. Sometimes we are left, not quite knowing who our real self is, when we strip away all of our commitments and responsibilities.
One’s real life is so often the life that one does not lead
Oscar Wilde
Even knowing what your real life might be can be challenging. It takes time and space to connect with our ‘real self’.
Joseph Campbell reminds us that:
You must have a place to which you can go in your heart, your mind, or your house, almost every day, where you do not owe anyone and where no one owes you – a place that simply allows for the blossoming of something new and promising.
What do you need to do to find that place where you do not owe anyone and where you do not know what anyone owes you? The place where you can be free from the walls and ceiling you have build around yourself – where you play small – live a life of should and shouldn’t, must and mustn’t.
I invite you to start today – find even 5 minutes, just for you, to recognise the possibilities offered in each moment – possibilities for the blossoming of something new and promising.
You do not need to know precisely what is happening, or exactly where it is all going. What you need is to recognise the possibilities and challenges offered by the present moment, and to embrace them with courage, faith and hope.
Thomas Merton