My dear friend Tracy Green emailed me with a thought provoking question…

What if everyone woke up each morning and said “What if?” What if everyone woke up each morning and said “I wonder”. What if we helped them to realize that part in themselves? What if we spread the word of wonder? What if…
And what if you do exactly what you want to do today. Without the slightest care of what others think. What would you do?

I loved the question in the abstract, but when he asked me directly what I wanted to do today – what would my day look like if I could do exactly what I wanted… my brain did some sort of hiccup and stopped in its tracks.

I never would have put it this way, but living as a single mom, running a house and farm, running my own business, being involved in all the things I do, keeps me fairly ‘other’ directed when it comes to the nuts and bolts of my daily life.

Now, I’m a HUGE proponent of self-care, and I practice what I preach… but that’s more like pulling into rest stops along the road.

The thought of taking an ENTIRE day, and doing exactly what I wanted… that felt tantalizing, exotic, and surprisingly out of reach.

This, in itself, was a powerful awareness.

I leaned into the question… dislodging the tendrils of responsibility for those in my life, and allowing myself to breathe into this extravegant possibility. What would I want? Did I even know?

I’m not an innately organized person, so it was no shock that the awareness came, not as a schedule, but as flashes, pictures, feelings that tugged at me…

Space… quiet… reflection… sharing… these were the things I hungered for.

Images floated to mind… lying on the ground under the big oak tree, watching the clouds track across the sky, framed against the dry rattling leaves… indulging in a good novel. Not a personal growth book – but STORY – engaging, delightful, magical… that sparks my imagination and sweeps me away with the beauty and lyricism of richly woven words, characters that invite me to explore hidden aspects of myself, and the age old saga of becoming – the hero’s quest – playing out yet again, before me…
Time with my boys… appreciating who they are… soaking in their humor, wisdom, and insight.
A long walk… listening to birds calling out to each other with an urgency only they understand, in the late afternoon, and breathing in the chill of autumn mixed with damp plowed earth and fallen leaves…
Conversation with close friends – sharing of hearts… calling forth the whisper of eternity within each of us… finding the love that we are, reflected back from the other…
A glass of wine at night, by the wood stove. Writing… the pulse and thrum of the day, taking new shape, unravelling secrets, as it spill out into words…
Resting with Jeff by the fire, my old guitar reawakened in his hands – music flowing from his fingers.
Sitting wrapped in his arms – safe. loved. loving.
Worries banished.
Fears forgotten.
No thought of tomorrow, or what is to be…
Just breathing… sunk in the timelessness of the moment.

And even now, it’s still swirling around inside me.

So, I’d like to ask you this same question.

What if you could do exactly what you wanted to do today… without the slightest care of what other’s thought, or the pull of responsibilities on you. What would you do?

Spend some time with this. A surface level answer won’t satisfy – but let yourself open to the hunger within you, and answer from your belly, from your bones. What pulls at you? What do you long for? What teases with delight?

And allow yourself to BE with what comes up… honoring the deep wisdom that is within.

Noticing what shifts inside… just with the recognition.

Welcome home to you.

Here’s to you – leaning into the places you come alive…

Celebrating all that you are…

Elizabeth Love