We often hear when we’re going through a difficult time, to give it time. And many times, my thought has been, well, how much time!? When is this going to feel better? And the answer is, when it’s time. I know that time does some amazing things. It can heal. It can give us perspective. It can give us strength, love, and it can give us what we need to move on, or start over. Time, as it turns out, is the answer to a lot of things, but it takes time to get time.
When I was new in my journey time was all I thought about. I could see others who had started before me, who had more time, and I wanted to be there, to jump ahead to that time, and already feel better, or feel how I thought those people were feeling, but since I had already gotten myself to an emotional and spiritual bottom by not wanting or allowing myself to feel my feelings, I was told I needed to learn to feel them right where I was, and that takes, you guessed it, time. I also had to accept that my time wasn’t anyone else’s time. We all heal, grow, learn on our own time, and it wasn’t my place to judge others time, nor was it there’s to judge mine, and I had to abide by that same rule with myself, I could not judge my own time, only live each moment to the best of my ability.
Time can seem infinite, daunting and empty, especially when we’re waiting to have it, so for me, on those days when I wanted to jump ahead, I had to focus on what was in front of me, do what was in front of my hands and take it moment by moment, minute by minute so I could keep moving forward with time, even if it was slower than I would have liked, but the key to being present for each moment of time was that I was actually living each moment, no matter how uncomfortable it was, I was there, feeling it and learning to make better choices for myself. And when I focused on each moment, I was able to start looking at larger increments of time, minutes, to hours, to days to months, to years. Each moment of time has added up to almost 14 years now, and yet still, like today, I sometimes have to dial it back to just this moment and keep it simple for myself so I don’t run away from time.
With time I do have the privilege to look back at my journey, so see how far I’ve come, and to notice what I still struggle with. Time shows me my patterns, my highs and my lows, and as it shows me that it also let’s me see that all of it, the good and bad, passes, because time never stops moving, even if we get stuck in it, stuck somewhere, time doesn’t stop, it moves past us until we catch up. Time is a blessing that way, it walks with us, and shows us our past, and it offers us the hope of the future, but that hope isn’t an invite to get ahead of it, just some light to look for as we keep moving forward in time.
We all love time when it’s working in our favor, the trick is to realize that it may always be, even when it’s adding stress or moving too slowly, there’s always a reason for time moving just as it is, and even when it doesn’t seem so, it may always be on our side, even when it seems like it’s working against us. Time, like everything in life, is going to tick along at it’s own pace, so why not learn to dance in it’s rhythm and trust that it’s moving at just the right speed to allow us to get what we need out of our time each day. SLAY on!
SLAY OF THE DAY: Do you make the most of your time? Do you live in the moment or do you find yourself looking into your past or surfing into the future? Why do you think you do that? What stops you from living in the moment? What are you afraid of? Why are you not comfortable just where you are? What can you do in this moment to accept where you are? There is nothing we can do to slow down or speed up time, so why not appreciate it and learn to make the most out of the time we have.
S – self L – love A – appreciate Y – you
