It’s time.

These are the times we get to experience.

I had to remind myself of this today.

We are spending a couple of days in upstate New York, in a space with quiet, cool, and space to think. It’s not unlike Samsø, the small island in Denmark where I usually live when I am home. Rolling hills. Lots of green. Breeze. Bright flowers. Cats belonging mostly just to themselves roaming the gardens. I feel peaceful and at ease, like I have time to catch up to my thoughts.

However, as always with this feeling of ease comes a certain level of bad conscience. I am worried that I am just being and not doing. Also, and most annoyingly, it comes with a certain concern for … authenticity, I guess. What I mean is this: I know that I did not feel this strong need for solitude and quiet before the pandemic, and I know I do now. Did I have this feeling before but ignored it? Did it arise out of the distortion of isolation? Is it just a matter of age? And so is this need for spaciousness truly authentic, is it truly “me”?

I will never know. And, as I remind myself, it doesn’t matter: these are the times we get to experience. Each part of these times is significant and not important. Each part is new and ancient. Each part just is.

Not quite coincidentally (because, of course) I brought a book with me about it being time for us all to think, and to allow each other to think, deeply and with our full selves. I have been sitting in quiet with some of the reflections of that book and will be sharing as I progress. I know this to be true: these times that we get to experience are times to re-envision who we are, and how we want to be together.

Yoga and sitting in stillness are tools to make space for that re-envisioning. At least they are for me. What are your tools? Can we share?