Monday Insight: I'm Busy - What We Really Mean

Make yourself a lovely cup of tea & enjoy this Monday's Insight.

I was lying in my bed.

The exhaustion of an intense week of shifting emotions, re-constructing beliefs, and laying new foundations in my relationships had brought me to the realization early in the day that I needed to spend a great deal of time sleeping, and recouping.

In my mind, as I delighted in picking up a book I’d been wanting to start for months now, and I turned the page, all the things I needed to do, and wanted to do other than reading the book sprang to my mind, along with the self talk that I needed to be productive.

That is when the voice started backing me into a corner of my own mind. The book fell by the wayside, and I became paralysed my my own actions.

I had to keep busy, and if I wasn’t busy I would not be successful in the areas I had been putting all my energy into.

I attempted to pick the book back up, my body fighting to stay in bed, while my intellectual mind buzzed with the knowledge that I had a book to write, and I better get busy.

12 hours later and I have started the chapter, only not in the way that I wanted it to look like when I started it, and not by pushing myself into doing. I did it by letting go, and working with my body, and the messages it was sending me, and yet it wasn’t my only push into embracing the rest that I needed and the truth that what I had left, would still be there when I woke up, ready, and if not even more full of intention and inspiration than before.

How did I get to the realization that I could take a break? That even in sleep I was being productive and that I needed to listen to the process rather than me attempting to control it by being busy?

I was confronted with my Shadow, a part of myself that I had long been attempting to understand, yet had never quiet pinpointed until I received a call from a loved one. In the conversation we were discussing our week, and both of us shared that we were tired, for different reasons. I made a comment that my week had been ‘busy’ and that I was not tired and needed to rest.

What I really wanted to say was that I was tired and I needed rest, but to me resting and staying stagnant was not something I appreciated, and I will do anything to remain active, even sometimes to the cost of my health [I am learning] I went about expressing this to myself while I listened to my loved one talk, and make plans. I thought about how I am practicing voicing what I really need, and want, rather than feeling justified.

The conversation took a turn; I was met with a laugh, one that hit me hard. The conversation proceeded with my loved one’s long list of things that they had done, and how I couldn’t be as tired as them, or even really justify that I was, because they had done so much more, and deserved the title of being the busiest. It was at that moment I felt in competition with my loved one, that they were creating a podium in which to express themselves in a way that was more showcasing then embracing. I was triggered, and I nearly reacted, and I would have verbally, had I not picked up on it in that moment: the truth, the shadow and what it meant.

The truth that this was a belief I had been told my whole life, and had experienced with this person, and others around me, and participated in myself as the receiver and giver of the projection.

I let myself feel the fear, the pain, the understanding of difference, and went inwards to look at how that one idea had played out in my life in various ways, begging to get my attention, and awareness.

That belief was that if I was not busy, if I was stagnant, if I did not do as much, or was not exhausted by submitting to the obligations that were created by others and from by myself, then what I had done was not valid, and could not be measured by that person as a success.

Since that person was a primary caregiver in my life from birth, it was no surprised to me then that I have taken on this belief as my own, even when I knew within myself that there was as much importance in relaxation and making your own choices, and path as there is in being busy and working for others.

This hurt, it cut me to realize that they were mirroring back to me a side of myself that I continued to suppress and deny existed. I thought back to the times when I had done the same thing to those I loved, and while I experienced a few minutes of shame, and guilt that was suffocating, once I could breathe through it and accept that I did that, I was also able to be compassionate towards the person mirroring it to me, and embrace it as a gift. I had brought it to the surface, seen it, lived in it, and know I could work with it, use it as a path of light rather than darkness to integrate into my daily life, and to lessons in my thoughts about busyness had to offer.

What it made me realize; the shadow side to ‘being busy’

If the shadow side of the ‘busy complex’ is the unexpressed parts of ourselves; both positive and negative, then it stands to reason that the shadow aspect of busyness is all the parts of yourself that deny what it is realling going on. What we have been told it means, and the battle between living the expectations of society, alongside or even outside our own.

We need to be seen as making a difference, being productive, living life to the fullest. The thing is, you can be doing that by taking time to rest, or reading a book or even spending an entire afternoon watching inspirational videos on YouTube; you can be productive by day dreaming and doing nothing.

There is a need to really look at the differences between stagnation and avoidance. For there are times when if we ask ourselves and listen to the truth we can see that we are using ‘busy’ as an excuse to avoid ourselves or other people. To resist looking at what we can do to change, and what needs to change so that we can move outside the energy of stagnation and the illusions of being trapped.

Another side of this is the idea around being obligated, and how ‘busy’ is often provoked by all the obligations that we take on, sometimes to the detriment of our mental and physical health. We need to let go of this victim mentality of suffering and step up into act of delegating, asking, and taking ownership of our path in life. No one can put anything on you that you do not have the choice to say no to, and learning to say no is one of the key tools in being able to let go of other peoples ideals of what busy mean and to really understand what your own are.

The reality is we make our own choices, and we can decide what we want, and need and when we want and need it. It doesn’t necessarily mean that will manifest it in the way that we want to. It is okay to have what we want, do what we want and express our emotions around that. It is okay to do, and act, and go after life, and live it to your own ideal of full capacity. To take that love for life and to filter it through everything you do, and every way you speak. I love to share my experiences with others, there is something empowering and encouraging in talking about what I have done and how it has changed my life, or all the things I am doing right now.

There is also the projected side of it, where I will stand on my grand podium and attempt to make people see the light about how being active and doing can assist you in making your life better. When really what I am saying when I am in this mode of thinking and acting, is that I sometimes believe if you’re not taking constant action, your life must be stagnant and going nowhere. I can see my own fears and reflections in that statement, and I know not to be harsh to myself about it.

I can look at what it means, and begin to question my beliefs around it, when at the core what I really want is for all people to be living their authentic bliss and to their full potential.

Coming back to the conversation with my loved one, I now had a starting point to first of all ask how that reflected in me, and take some steps into integrating that knowledge into my life, and also how I could better interact with that person when the issue came up again, if it ever does. Knowing this person, it will.

Next time I may react, the difference is I know that the pull and power of it won’t be as strong, and I know I will better understand the reasoning behind it, and be able to be firm in my convictions around being busy, and how I define success.

Coming to business from place of compassion and gratitude rather than superiority means understanding that most of us are coming from an old paradigm that is generational and are all going through an intense shift out of the darkness of what was, to what is. Each of us is on our own journey. Some of us may feel we are going at a slower or faster pace than those around us.

By being gentle and receptive with ourselves and others, we can be open to the gift of what it brings up. We can begin to lessen the suffering and victim mentality that we have created to prove others and ourselves that our journey means something.