Constant and Consistent.

"Promise to stay wild with me. We'll seek and return and stay to find beauty and the extraordinary in all the spaces we can claim. We'll know how to live.

How to breathe magic into the mundane."

-Victoria Erickson

Constant vs. Consistent - Both words describe something that occurs without interruption or change. However, while consistently implies a regular pattern of behavior or outcome, constantly implies that something occurs continuously, without stop or deviation.

The Brain

I went on a solo camping trip (with Dozer) this weekend. We packed up the adventure vehicle and drove 2 hours north to escape. All components of me were firing on all cylinders and I needed to give myself a break. Work has been pulling on every limb in all directions, personal life is taking up a lot of head & heart space all the while trying to balance time to sweat and push my body (apologies to Francisco for lack of logs). With escaping, there was a fear in having too much time on my hands allowing for way too many thoughts or it was going to give me some breathing room.

Spoiler: it gave me both.

For as long as I can remember in my adult life, consistency has been key for me in how I show up for others and is one of the things I value the most, but rarely find, in others.

In dealing with some personal things, recently, I'm learning that my brain is one consistent mother fucker, too. And, to be quite honest, I actually don't know if it's a conscious thing or something else.

Bear with me while I try to explain this...

The last couple of weeks have been really testing my ability to dig deep, take inventory, question and remind myself of...myself, and to do actual work - conscious, mindful and deliberate work to move and shift.

Every morning I've been waking up with the same theme of thoughts...and it's not actually any specific thought ie: 'I wonder how XYZ is doing?" It's not anything like that. It's more of an all around...energy / feeling? (This is where I have trouble trying to articulate this. I've been trying for days.) A scaled down example could be: waking up thinking of your mom but not having any specific thoughts...like there's just some sort of energy pull or vibe around mom, ya know?

Anyhow, it's been like that for weeks. No matter what I try to do - every single morning that vibe / energy starts my day. And while we're on it, it stays throughout the day and is the last thing when I get to bed. I have tried everything to move that energy but it is constant and consistent. Run it out on the treadmill, meditating, breathing exercises, journaling, talking it out...nothing.

Then I noticed the feeling of resistance. When I feel that, it's a flag for me; I pay attention to it. With reason, if it doesn't flow, it's not for me. And, here, I felt that I was fighting with myself. So, rather than trying to go through the obstacle course to move this through me, I'm deciding to sit with it, observe it without judgement and let it do its thing. Though sometimes inconvenient and distracting, it feels much better than constantly battling myself. In time, it will move one way or another.

The Heart

I'm really grateful for its capacity. As I think back about what all it has faced throughout its lifetime, what it has offered (and continues to offer), what it has recovered from, how ridiculously malleable yet grounded and steady it stays, and still beats the way that it does - I'm one lucky kid.

The couple of things I am so sure of and proud of: its resilience and capacity. There have been so many times where it gets tired of running the continuous marathons and needs rest. But once rested, it takes inventory and comes back better with new learnings. The other side to the exhaustion is when it feels the fireworks. I want to feed it more of that.

I work really hard to not grow to have a hardened heart. The most beautiful thing I love about myself is, in fact, my heart. It is the pinnacle of who I am, how I operate and how I show up for myself and for others.

Side note:

I originally started writing this 4-5 days ago because I was getting so frustrated and exhausted with the perseveration and was looking for more ways to get it out of my system so I could shift.

Instead, as I am finishing this off today, I'm sitting here really thankful for who I am.

I'm pretty fucking above-average rad.

Tangential: With the exception of the few times these past few weeks, it's really rare when things bring me to tears (I don't say that as a weird flex, it's just a reality). That said, I must be a ball of feels today, because I watched this video and my eyes got teary. I've been following this family's story since before Naiya was born.

I'm a big fan of The Skin Deep. With balance, if you're looking to deepen connections and if it matters to you, I'd recommend asking yourself how you can facilitate that and find the tribe of people that can meet you there. Many resources out there.