Working with What You’ve Got

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‘Up until now many of us have secretly believed that we had to wait until things calmed down a bit before we started to get our acts together. Tomorrow we’ll begin discovering authentic pleasures. Tomorrow we’ll treat ourselves to better. Tomorrow we’ll take the time to enjoy ourselves. Tomorrow, when everything calms down. This I can report from the front lines: life never calms down long enough for us to wait until tomorrow to start living the lives we deserve. Life is always movement, always change, always unforeseen circumstances. There will always be something trying to grab your attention: the phone, the child, the fax, the car breaking down, the check that never arrives in the mail. Let’s just acknowledge that as far as real life is concerned, we are only one step away from dealing with dysfunction.

So what are we going to do about that? We can stop waiting for life to become perfect and start working with what we’ve got to make it as satisfying as we can. We can accept, bless, give thanks, and get going. Today, we can begin to call forth the riches from our everyday life. Today we can move from lack to abundance. Procrastination has robbed us of too many precious opportunities. Call a friend for lunch, begin to read or even write that novel, organize your papers, try a new recipe for dinner, smile at everyone you meet, sit and dream before a blazing fire, pick up your needlepoint again, act as if you’re grateful to be alive, scatter joy. Think of one thing that would give you a genuine moment of pleasure today and do it. Great! The first steps in the journey are always the most difficult to take. “Life begets life. Energy creates energy,” the famous French actress Saran Bernhardt reminds us. “It is by spending oneself that we become rich.” ‘- Sarah BanBreathnach, Simple Abundance A Daybook of Comfort and Joy

This describes me to a ‘T’ as if I wrote the words myself!

Every single day of my life there is something I will do later.

When the twins start school, I will finally be able to ____________.

If I could buy some organizational containers, I could get my laundry room organized.

When the kids are grown, my house will finally be clean.

After Matthew is born, I will re-paint our bedroom. (He is 10 months old and it is still not re-painted.)

They are excuses. Plain and simple- excuses.

And not once did I ever think to myself, until I revisited the Simple Abundance book, that I was simply delaying myself the life I deserve. You can read more about that here.

I look at people in other countries who have no running water, no stove, only one pot and ten children to feed. Yet, they find a way to make a fire and c.o.o.k. a pot of rice.

It all makes sense now. They are simply working with what they’ve got, instead of working against themselves.