Anti-Anxiety Tool of the Week: Take a Break
Ahhhhhhhhh...be kind to yourself. (Have I said that before?) Step back for a few seconds. Take a deep breath. If you are thirsty, drink some water, or make a cup of tea. Take a bath. Go outside and feel the breeze. Smile. Laugh. Have a little fun!
This tool is from Anti-Anxiety Toolkit #5. Here's the Index of all toolkits. And The Mini-Toolkit: For Those with Little or No Time.
Where You're Bravely Working: Grief & Hope
If you are in the midst of grief, old or new, I join the poet Rumi in wishing you hope and tender blessings. (He--a grand river; I--a small creek in the wilderness.)
Your Grief
Your grief for what you've lost holds a mirror up to where you're bravely working. Expecting the worst, you look and instead, here's the joyful face you've been wanting to see.
Your hand opens and closes and opens and closes. If it were always a fist or always stretched open, you would be paralyzed.
Your deepest presence is in every small contracting and expanding, the two as beautifully balanced and coordinated
as birdwings.
Jelaluddin Rumi
13th century Persian mystic
(interpreted by Coleman Barks)
Pay attention to the new warmth,
the budding verses,
the jiggling, juggling streams
of spring.
Just a tiny joy to start
if your grief is too great.
There will be warmth enough in
this new season of beginnings
to allow the old cloak
of reasons and loss to slide away.
Dawn E. Hunt
Until next time,
Dawn
Photo credits:
Baby elephant, Anolis01, iStock
Bird, Jacques le Henaff, unSplash
Stream, Simon Wilkes, unSplash