Who Has The Time?

I've been thinking a lot about time lately. When I was little, I'd asked my dad what he wanted for a present and he's always laugh and say, "time". So, one year, I bought him a bottle of "thyme" as a joke - not really understanding why he felt like he had so little.

Later in life, as many of us finally got around to having children in our 40's, I can remember my friend, Steve's remark after the birth of his first child: "Ohmygod, the time I wasted! What was I doing with myself all those years?!"

Now, I've reached a point in my life where I'm beginning to understand how my dad felt. And I am seeking to recapture that sense of timelessness that I had when I was younger. As children, an afternoon lasts a lifetime. Next week might as well be next year. And a year... well, that's an eternity. Children are present to the joy of being alive on a moment by moment basis.

I look at the ever growing "List of Things To Do" and despair of having the time to get it all done. Am I just cramming more into my day? or am I not drilling down into each moment for all its worth? I have a sneaking suspicion that it's the latter. And I know I'm not alone.

As adults, we find ourselves ever tilting forward towards life. "I can't wait for the weekend." "When I retire, I'm going to..." "In my next career...." And the days just blur by, we're exhausted, and we miss so much... until the future finally begins to look a lot shorter and a bit scarier, and we find ourselves looking back. What did we do with all that time? Where were we? Racing to the future. Trapped in the past. Somewhere in between.

Every time my son tells me he hates my cell phone (because I'm often leashed to it), I am reminded of my mother's main piece of parenting advice, "Give your children your time." Life happens right now. In this moment. Don't miss it.

Put down the cell phone and schedule joy first. This is my reminder to myself.

I tell my patients this kind of stuff all the time and I need to hear it too. Today, it was from a patient, who shared his new list of goals with me. They are:

1) Be one with his environment.
2) Understand what people tell and show you, not what you want to see.
3) Be inquisitive.
4) Seek pleasurable experiences.
5) Try new things.

If not now, when?

I'll close with my favorite quote - one that I hope will be my epitaph:

"Living is
A thing you do.
Now or never?
Which do you?"
~ Piet Hein

I wish you joy... right now.
Thanks for reading.

peace,
Janice

What Do I Do?

When I tell people that I am an acupuncturist, they immediately think of the needles. Oddly enough, this always surprises me. It's like saying a poet works with pencils.

In short, my “cocktail party answer” for what I do is that 1) I make grown-ups lie down and 2) I help them – body, mind, & spirit – remember how to respond to life the way they did when they were little.

If you watch a small child, they have what we call a smooth flow of qi. They eat when they're hungry, they sleep when they're tired, they're happy when they're happy, they're sad when they're sad... they experience pain and yet don't suffer from it. They skin their knee and cry while it hurts and when it stops, they're on to the next thing. If you bring it up later, all they have to say about it is, “Look, I got a cool bandaid!” They aren't attached to the past, reliving the pain, or worried about pain in the future. They just roll along in the present.

As we age, we start to get attached to the past or the future. We begin to buy into what people say about us or what we say about ourselves. We learn to override the signals we get from our bodies: “I'll skip lunch and get this done.” “I'll just push through tonight & sleep tomorrow.” etc. And as a result, we no longer roll as smoothly. We begin to clunk along. And those clunks start to show up as physical pain, emotional upset, poor mental habits. 

All the needles & I do is ask experienced, intelligent questions that remind that version of life that is you how much smoother things could be. Really, it's you & your energy that do all the work.