I thought I was quite good at taking time for myself. Being an ME sufferer for some years now, I had got used to pacing myself and interspersing periods of activity with time for rest, relaxation, meditation, sitting in my garden watching the flowers grow... I learned to use the hours when my husband was out at work (earning enough for two of us - just - thank God) and I had all that time to fill with leisure activities so that when I ran out of energy I could flop in a chair and do something restful that I grew to love. Writing became one of my first loves. My garden was the other one. Putting those two together was my shortcut to heaven.
Gradually things improved and I got a part-time job which I also enjoyed. But the hours at home still gave me plenty of time for myself and I would sit, watch, listen, sense, think and write to my heart's content. I think some of my fit, healthy friends were a touch jealous of my disability!
Nowadays we have just moved house and my husband is semi-retired. Two good reasons for being busy. Two? Well, I went to a great workshop the other day and discovered I'm not so good at taking time for myself as I thought I was. Read on! Dr. Julie Leoni, a charming, unassuming, ordinary person, like the rest of us in every way except for the slightly intimidating doctorate, told us a little of her life history, documented in greater detail in her latest book: Love Being Me. From being a busy wife, mother, teacher, trainer and coach she snapped one day and turned into a jelly-like shivering wreck, lying on the floor, howling and scribbling. How did that happen? Basically through a wrongly-motivated sense of priorities which left Julie and her personal needs way at the bottom of the list, only ever receiving attention when all the 'important' things of life were finished - which, of course, they never were. A process of unlearning, learning and re-learning followed until Julie arrived at the point at which she finds herself today - loving herself and taking time out of her busy life to make sure she does more and more of what she loves to do. Life is too short to do anything else.
Inspired by her workshop and book, I have come to a realisation. I am not so good any longer at taking time for myself - only snatching it! Snatching it is different and still involves relegating myself and my needs to the bottom of the pile, to be achieved only when the more 'necessary and important' tasks are done. As a result I become tired, I start to 'do' out of a position of drivenness and rushing to meet deadlines and I become duller and less vibrant as a person. Like this I have less to offer the world. In actual fact, Ihave learned that all of us have a lot to offer the world - wisdom, energy, inspiration, creativity - if only we abandon our regime of guilt, 'should', other people's demands and unjustified 'needs'. Of course, it's great to help those around us, lovely to have time for other people we love or just those around us in our wider community, but if we forget ourselves and allow life to squeeze out those moments of self-awareness and just 'being', we're lost.
Currently, my ME condition is improving - hooray!! I have had energy for this new phase of my life, for packing and unpacking, for the time-consuming and exhausting activity of house-hunting, for the stresses and strains of being temporarily of no fixed (permanent) abode and the rigours of adjusting to somewhere new. In fact, I am re-energised by all of this! I am delighted to have the love of my life increasingly more present in my everyday life as a consequence of his (almost) retired status. Again, hooray! But I have realised, these past few days, that this has given me two more reasons to cease taking time for myself. I no longer have hours to 'fill'.
We are engaged together on the busy and delightful tasks of unpacking and creating our new home. We have endless (it seems) boxes to unpack. We have new friends to make. We have new activities to try out. We have new places to explore. We have each other for company and can plan the days together. But those times of gentle contemplation, those moments for reflection, those hours filled with writing can now only be snatched, not taken. I have to guard against this. I am hearing no judgemental sounds from my husband. None at all. They are only in my head. He is happy for me to take time. He is aware of my still fragile reserves of energy and my need for rest. It's only me, still learning to love myself, to love being me and to indulge myself now and then - or maybe more often than that! I'm on a learning curve again - from snatching to taking - from a sneaky, guilt-ridden activity squashed into moments when my husband is in the shower or I have already done my share of the chores, to a willing, whole-hearted conviction that I am worth it. And so I am! Thank you Julie Leoni! I needed that timely reminder.
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