Learning to be Lazy

“We're so busy watching out for what's just ahead of us that we don't take time to enjoy where we are.” 
― Bill Watterson

I'm learning to be lazy. How to slow down long enough to enjoy the meal on my plate and the company around me. My head is often so full of thought that I get lost in futures that haven't happened yet. Time becomes an arrangement of meetings and meals and errands and 'leisure activities' that keep me running around madly trying to keep my world in balance. 

I am learning to be lazy.

I don't give myself much time to lie around. And if I am lying around then I have an assortment of activities from art, to writing, to socializing, to who knows what to be achieving. There seems to be this endless striving to prove something, but that something is unknown and to who is also unknown. I have been existing in this fear that if I slow down too long that I'll end up stuck and I won't have anything to show for this life that I am living. 

And then I catch myself. I take a deep breath and I look at the life in front of me. I take another breath and look at the life behind me. And then I breathe a deep and wild breath that brings me to exactly where I am. I am learning to be lazy. To be enough, exactly as I am now, and to allow myself to exist in non-action. To be receptive to what life wants to offer to me as I wander through it. To take care of this body, and this heart, and this wild piece of humanity that I am, and to rest in it deeply.

I am learning to be lazy.

To see the beauty between working hard and playing hard. Between unwavering presence with the world that is directly in front of us and the us we are in the world. I have lived in motion for the past 6 years. With adventures lined up as far as I could see, and romance weaving it's way between the stories. I wrote a million stories for how my life would go, each one dissolving as they slipped into the next one. And suddenly, I have landed here. 

And I'm starting to see just how okay here is. That the world won't end if I sit and watch three episodes of new girls in my undies with my roommates. Or alone. And that I won't ever be 'stuck' if I don't want to be stuck. I am learning that there is an art to enjoying each day as it presents itself to us. To putting our hearts into the work in front of us, and to give our time and love to the people and things that matter to us, and to surround ourselves with the people and places that matter to us.

I am learning to be lazy and to be joyful in my laziness. Cause sometimes all we need is a cold beer and a close friend to watch the earth spin around the sun with, while we sit still and enjoy it all.