When breathing is impossible

This week, breathing has been almost impossible, and I have been one day ahead no matter what I do. Monday, thinking it was Tuesday, Tuesday thinking it was Wednesday, and so on.

I know it is all related. When I cannot be present, I cannot breathe deeply. When I cannot breathe deeply, I feel disconnected from myself. When I feel disconnected from myself, everything else is at top volume, too jarring to engage with.

There is no clear reason, but rather oodles of little things churning in my head, like a soup of threads that is neither tasty nor nourishing. There is only one remedy: sitting, in silence and quiet, for as long as my mind will let me, and gratefulness for what there is.

Flowers blooming in the park. The kindness of strangers. The beautiful shining light in each one of us.

I can’t always manage to place my focus there. There is too much dirt on my floor and dust on my shelves, literally and figuratively. I need to clean. And yet I cannot manage to motivate other than for the things that are absolutely necessary.

And so I sit.