I don’t know about you, but I spend a lot of time in a dream state – and not because I’m curled up in my comfy bed snoozing (I LOVE true sleep SO much!). I spend a lot of time dreaming about the past and the future. My mind flies toward sparkly nuggets of past conversations and events, and it also likes to wander into the future looking for interesting little jewels of possibility.
The trouble is that my Body follows my Mind.
For example, yesterday was a perfectly lovely day. I was home in my nest with my dogs sipping coffee and reading a perfectly good book. Lovely. It was everything my introvert heart fantasizes about.
At some point in the early afternoon, I found myself in my kitchen, getting set to boil water and feeling very anxious. My belly felt tight, and I was jittery. I was almost looking over my shoulder as though I might catch someone coming after me (I know, it sounds a little crazy). I was out of sorts – completely uncomfortable in my own skin. It was like I’d been sleeping, and I woke up in an anxious body. Can you dig? (as Eddie Dean of Stephen King’s Dark Tower series, might ask).
For a split second, I was confused. Why am I anxious? Everything is Fine with a capital F. It took me a bit to realize that I’d been dreaming.
I’d been spinning a story in my mind (that, by the way, wasn’t even my own story) based on a Client’s visit from earlier in the day and a friend’s rough patch. The two stories, or dreams if you will, were intermingling. I was asleep to my house, my dogs, and my perfectly Fine book and day. I was asleep to Reality.
The power of the mind/body connection is SO CRAZY. Even AFTER I woke up to what was real in my present moment, my BODY continued to play like it was in the dream. My Body continued to feel jittery and anxious…residual goo from my waking dream. But after a while, after some very conscious breathing and some time being deliberately conscious of my current environment, my Body responded by settling down.
Guys, if you are not fully awake in the present moment, you are risking your serenity. That’s the simple truth. It’s so important, I’m going to repeat it and put it in a bigger font:
If you are not fully awake in the present moment, you are risking your serenity.
The more time you spend (I spend, we spend) dreaming in the past or future, the more time you spend (I spend, we spend) in a body that feels anxious, sad, angry, resentful, regretful, and any number of other uncomfortable sensations.
So wake up.
Look around you RIGHT NOW. What’s really going on? If you’re like me – not much. Not really anyway. My fingers are moving on the keyboard, my dog is laying against my feet, and I’m breathing. My present moment is pretty damn mellow. My future dream – which includes a time that may be closer than I’d like – includes me mourning the loss of my sweet dog and wondering if I’ll be able to make my mobile business a possibility. That dream may be true one day. But it isn’t a real THING right now.
The Reality of the Present Moment is a pretty great deal. Can you dig?
There’s another sweet little secret here. It’s this: If you (I, we) ACT from the Dream rather than from the Present Reality, you (I, we) run the risk of regretting the action that you (I, we) took! Whoa!!!!! Drink that in for a minute. I’ll write more about that one in the next entry.