I would not use the word ‘enjoy’ to describe what I did at yoga class this morning.
I didn’t even manage to love the relaxation part at the end this week (the promise of which is what keeps me coming back).
I wobbled my way down the stairs (really, who puts an exercise class up a flight and a half of stairs?!) and started to wonder if my three month fling with exercise had maybe run its course (ha!). I wondered if it had been worth dragging myself out of bed instead of rolling over, as I had so dearly wanted to.
And then, as I splashed through the puddles towards my car, turning my collar up against the driving rain, I started to notice something. My body felt good. It felt strong. The endorphins were doing their thing. The class had been a slog, but the rest of my day felt suddenly manageable. Shoulders back, head up, I grinned into the cloudy sky and jingled my keys in my pocket.
Warrior Pose
Why does it always take us so long to learn (and re-learn, and re-re-learn) that the things that are hard, the things that are scary, the things that we just-don’t-wanna-do-waaaaah turn out to be the things that make us stronger, braver and more able to live life with our heads held high and our shoulders back?
Sitting down to write can be scary. Pushing through the soggy middle of a story can be hard. It can hurt. It can bore us. We can want to do anything else in the world other than the hard thing.
And then we get to the end of a writing session, or the end of a story, and we can’t imagine anything (ANYTHING) that we would rather have been doing than writing.
So, as you sit down to write today, channel my yoga teacher who reminds us every week,
“This is your time.”
This is your time. Shoulders down, head up, keep breathing, and write.
What about you? Are you writing regularly? Do you find it easy to reach that point where your writing endorphins starts to flow? Or are you still struggling to get out of bed? What do you think would make the difference to you?