We’ve been well-taught in our culture to run from doing one thing to another, to squeeze in as much as possible into our days and lives, and to multi-task, when possible, all in the name of productivity.
We have lost the art of paying attention to our lives, and the art of being present to the moment.
One of the exercises that was required when I was being trained as a Life Coach was a mindfulness meditation, about remaining present and paying attention to what is right in front of me.
It nearly drove me mad.
The assignment was to spend time (how long, I cannot now remember, but it was a significant period of time, perhaps 30 minutes, maybe longer), being with Under Your Kitchen Sink.
We were simply to put our attention on Under Our Kitchen Sinks, and to pay full attention to Under Our Kitchen Sinks.
We were invited to be extremely curious and engaged. About Under Our Kitchen Sinks.
You cannot begin to imagine how difficult I found that to be. Try it sometime.
I learned that simply being present and paying attention to what is in front of us is not for the faint of heart. To show up, fully present and fully engaged, with my life (which was Under the Kitchen Sink, in that case), was a challenge.
My inner gremlins had a field day. Why are you doing this? You are wasting time. Do you know how many other things you should be doing? What a complete and utter waste of time. I really need to clean this cupboard out. What demonic mind dreamed up this exercise? Blah blah blah.
Each time my mind ran off, I brought it back. I was cultivating attention.
This exercise paradoxically turned out to be one of the most meaningful ones of my training experience, once I debriefed it and thought about the parallels in my life.
I invite you to cultivate attention. Learn how much you show up to your life, really. How much of you is available to experience the fullness of your life, right in this moment? My answers to those questions weren’t pretty. 🙂
Why would you want to do this? Good question, and certainly one that I was asking.
Because maybe, just maybe, the fullness of life and vitality is everywhere, even under a kitchen sink, and we are missing a large chunk of it.
As Mary Oliver has said: “When it’s over, I want to say that I was the bride, married to amazement.”
P.S. Under My Sink doesn’t look like this, and I didn’t draw it during the exercise (that was verboten; just cultivate full attention). I drew it just to illustrate this blog post.
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