Routine. It's a word that calms frazzled nerves and puts order into life seemingly in a state of never-ending upheaval. It's maintaining a clean home, prioritizing the bills, dressing to ensure I don't slip into the realm of mother undone. It's regulating the events of the day so as to feel confident that every thing and everyone I love is taken care of. It's knowing that from one moment to the next all that I can control, is controlled; that perhaps my heart will not beat as quickly, fear will not overwhelm my senses, and panic will be left at bay if the unexpected threatens to knock me to the ground and leave me spattered and exposed on the sidewalk.
If someone were to ask me if I was a spontaneous or controlled person, invariably my answer has always been, controlled. And yet...
I am mother, racing around the house after my boys, soaking up their mock fright and squeals of laughter. I am woman craving the fragrant night air, out as often as I can, drinking in the heaven starlight cradled by billowing clouds idling by. I am impulsive and energetic, riotous and irreverent. I am better at surprising with gifts from my heart than honoring significant dates on a calendar. I wear my heart on my sleeve and love with untamed intensity - a fierce tigress who should never be cornered. I am fire and flame and cannot be doused for I know nothing could keep me from escaping the grate.
Wry smile. So...
It would seem that all this talk of controlling routine is purely a matter of relativity. Safety is merely a turn of thought. Pain or dismay can swiftly turn into serene calm within as little as five minutes no matter the personal value of the crisis or disappointment. The question then becomes: how long will one remain in stasis - absorbing, courting, wallowing within dark currents before awareness of this relativity hits?
As I move through experience after experience, each having brought differing levels of growth in uncertainty, I am finding that I not only survive them, but I continue to flourish; I not only remain viable, but I become more powerful. Spirited. Better. Stronger. Alive. As conscious thought wraps itself around my own theory of relativity, the time spent in frazzled worry lessens with each occurrence. Which has my long-winded, ever-uncontrolled, streaming flow of unsolicited, unedited consciousness finally coming to the real point: If disappointment, circumstance, delay or pain can morph into well-being on the change of thought (not to mention sometimes a bottle of wine or an entire chocolate cake), what do we have to gain by seeking a quick resolution if the decision found does not include all possible knowledge or consequence?
Why do we feel like we are left to the buffeting of a violent storm when things don't go as we plan, or even worse - we don't obtain immediate answers? Why the need to define a clear path right away? Safety? I think not. True safety would not support a decision with the primary motivator being a blinding need to feel less fear, pain or worry. True safety lies in finding internal truth - in bending self and building soul.
If a sense of safety can be turned by a carton of Ben & Jerry's (keeping it real), then true growth can only happen by stepping out during the eye of the storm and surveying the damage so as to learn how to best survive the remainder of the fray. There is so much to learn within the fragmented moments of our lives. Having the courage to seek the safety in the learning can save us from endless cycles of the same and change the very definition, outcome, subtlety and structure of what we ever considered to be well-being.
Embrace the unknown; don't waste so much negative energy wishing for the tidy bow gracing the perfectly controlled package. It's all relative. Float. Dance with it. Try sliding down the rays of sunshine sifting through those forbidding clouds like shots of golden silk gleaming in smoke and firelight. Poke through the cinders and find the ring; find your inner Eliza Doolittle and don't be satisfied with so many words with so little meaning - including those words you say to yourself. Find the joyful stillness in each moment and consider it a gift.
I don't know that I will ever be able to have a messy home; peace is my mantra. And God forbid that I would ever trade in my signature platform heels for sneakers. Sneakers!? Shudder. But I do know that control is merely relative and that true safety is found within the process. So don't be afraid to crack open the most expensive, exceptional bottle of wine. Give it time to aerate on the counter longer than you normally would. Leave behind anxious and allow the nuances of the vintage opportunity to smooth bitterness and enhance flavor and sweetness. Drink up this life. It's delicious no matter what. Cheers.
- The Carman Girl
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