Is Your Mind as Busy as Mine?
Learn to center and still your thoughts before taking action.
“The answers you seek never come when the mind is busy. They come when the mind is still; when silence speaks the loudest.”
Leon Brown, author
Y’all, January is such a loaded month. Between resolutions, forced positivity, and the anticipation of new things, I think I’m among the masses when I say that with a clear calendar ahead, January also carries great disappointment. And now, here comes February with no reprieve insight!
It’s not just about breaking resolutions or quitting in the middle of our goals — we can learn how to pivot and adjust. Maturity and refinement have given us the ability to ask for help and reach upward when we feel like we are sinking. But when I think of January, I want to think of clarity. A month of focus, renewed directions, and a new track to run.
Unfortunately, thanks to grief, January slaps hard. January holds two anniversaries of loss for me. Layering the loss with additional nuance is the fact that I consistently defend against the masses attempting to motivate me into something new. As much as I want to set a goal, I also want to find the time and focus to hit the targets from last year that I missed!
I don’t think I’m alone in feeling the weight of the world each January. I want to celebrate new beginnings, but it’s a challenge when you are also navigating anxiety or any number of other complications.
So today, I want to introduce to you an idea that to reach our own moments of clarity, we must invite the stillness like never before. We must see stillness and consent to it — embrace it, even — before we can ever move forward.
Consenting to stillness before movement in life is necessary. When we are in crisis, panic, or overwhelm — we freeze. I can’t tell you how many times this month overwhelm has locked down my ability to think, let alone formulate a coherent sentence.
When I chose consent, however, I am choosing to partner with the movement in my life that creates flexibility. A friend of mine has always said, “Blessed are the flexible, for they will not break.” When the onslaught of motivation implores me to move, the quiet invitation of consent reminds me to become still.
Centering prayer is the act of quietly consenting to the presence of God to arrive in your midst and to be the movement you desire. This daily action is a simple tool that brings me back to my baseline. When overwhelm and noise attempt to drown my boat, consent is the reminder that my hands have learned how to tread water.
Learn more about centering prayer online at cac.org.
And may you find great comfort in the stillness and movement ahead!
They are two sides of the same coin, after all.
Mandy Capehart is a certified grief and life coach, and creator of The Restorative Grief Project. The Restorative Grief Project is an online community focusing on one another’s stories and new methodologies for grief, creating a safe environment for our souls to heal and our spirits to be revived. To join for free, visit www.MandyCapehart.com/grief or follow along with weekly columns on Ask A Grief Coach!
