Gentle on My Mind
Living gratefully today, I am appreciate the way my limbs can bend, stretch, and move me from one place to another. As I move through the rooms of our home, I give thanks for heat, electricity, comfort.
Early mornings are gentle and quiet. I have always enjoyed this time of the day. New, fresh, loaded with potential for the hours ahead.
I have been carrying this image around in my head since I captured it the other morning after a light snowfall.
Gentle snow on leaves and grass, not crushing or smothering, just a blanket. How often are my thoughts like this—gentle, not all-consuming? More than they used to be, that’s for sure. Practice, in the form of mindful meditation and breathing, makes progress possible. So do growing self-awareness and self-compassion.
In a pause or a moment of silence, I can see or feel a thought for what it is—just a thought. I don’t have to let a negative thought pick up speed and become a runaway train of toxicity and an energy suck. I can let a grateful or inspired thought generate more grateful inspiration and good energy. Energy I need. Energy our world needs.
My brain and I are definitely works in progress with plenty of room for improvement yet. I get moments of clarity though, and our dog Oliver brought me one the other morning. I had been pretty active, moving around from one task to another. He was whining and pacing, and I realized he wanted me to sit down so he could sit down. (I am his person. He follows me a lot. I joke that it has kept him in shape as he has aged. There is probably some truth in that.)
I listened to Oliver and we both sat down and took in the Christmas tree lights and appreciated a restful pause. Oliver helped me be gentle on myself and gentle on my own mind. Thanks Oliver!
Gentle on my mind—a daily goal I aspire to and achieve in varying degrees. Even understanding and viscerally experiencing “gentle on my mind” is a substantial victory for this overthinker and overdoer.
Wait! I think I can honestly say that there are times I am just a doer and a thinker. The rhetoric and rumination that runs constantly has become gentler, and more readily notices when it turns harsh and reins itself back in.
A little progress goes a long way. Let’s be gentle today—with our thinking, actions, driving, listening. Gentle with ourselves and each other. Gentle on our minds.
