Life can become dry when you are going through the motions, concentrating on what you need to do next. Or when you are living in your brain. Or when you quit noticing anything outside of your own mind.
To bring back that juicier life, you need to get into the experience of the moment. You can find pleasure in the presence. Pleasure and enjoyment are dependent on how present you are with what you are doing. If you are present with the experience, moments can be more satisfying. You feel more alive when you pay attention.
You can rush through a shower looking over the to do list in your head, or you can feel the water, smell the lavender body wash, and experience what is happening. When you finished your shower, which way do you imagine would leave you feeling the best?
Have you every gone on a nature walk, only to realize you didn’t notice any nature? You got your steps in, but you didn’t embody your experience. You didn’t hear the birds or see the deer. People often ask how I get so many pictures of wildlife. They say when they go out they never see anything. You can easily miss creatures and when you aren’t paying attention.
I like to feel the heavy energy in my head and push it down in my imagination into my body. I can be in my head a lot. I am not naturally attuned with my body or what’s happening around me. I needed to create a system. Now, whenever my timer to drink more water goes off, I pause to check in with my body. What does it need? What would feel good?
I check in with my experience. Am I being present or am I analyzing, judging, wanting, or pressuring myself in my mind? What can I savor with the senses? How can I relish what I am doing?
Taking these breaks to ground back into the physical world feels so nourishing to me. I can delight more when I am paying attention to what is outside my mind.
When I don’t have a timer, I can get to the end of the workday realizing I didn’t drink water except at lunch. And I am stiff and wound up because I haven’t shut off my brain all day.
Life can be hard, so how can we find pleasure and enjoyment in the good experiences? Can you get present to the beauty of your houseplants or garden? I have another habit where when I get home from a car ride, I go into the backyard to see what has changed or what’s blooming. (It’s daffodils and violets right now.)
Perhaps you can give yourself a little hand massage when you put on lotion. Or feel the grass as you walk barefoot. Being where you are without wanting to be elsewhere, or planning your next thing or complaining about where you are.
These times of enjoyment that you choose to see and experience, can restore you and bring you out of your dry life. How can you be awake and aware in ordinary moments?
Your power, enjoyment, clarity and connection are all in the present moment. What ritual or reminder system can you create that will bring you into the now more often? How can you squeeze the joy from the moment you are having right now?
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