Stop the Merry-go-Round! I Want to Get Off! By Elizabeth Geyer

Dizzying…the world is spinning so fast right now!  How are you all?  I find it amazing that many of us are actually handling this pace and frenetic activity pretty well.  There are physical manifestations that aren’t so great, yet…there are also moments of bliss woven into each and every day.

I am sitting here in my friend’s Denver kitchen, looking out at the beautiful Fall foliage and feel grateful…oh so grateful.  In a world fraught with pain, there is still such beauty.  What is Our focus right now?  Can we focus upon these incredibly colorful falling leaves?  Being with this activity for even a few minutes can lower our blood pressure exponentially!  Discovering these new focus activities and having them innately ‘float’ in throughout these insanely active days has been so comforting.  For days, I was begging to get off the Merry-Go-Round of Life.  I had forgotten that I had the power to place my foot on the ground to stop it myself.  Oops!  Well…I am so glad I realized that I had the will to put my foot down. 

 Back to discovering ‘beauty focus’ activities.  The market was busy yesterday…lots of people in the store shopping, rather frenetically.  I stopped and looked at some magazines around the Fall Harvest.  My body took a deep breath and loved the focus point for the moment.  The photos of comfort foods were beautiful.  All of a sudden, I didn’t hear the hustle and bustle anymore.  I felt myself float into the photos, being with the sensory images of cooking and tasting delicious food.  Then…all was right again.  The noise of humanity irritation left!

Both of my nieces, who are not creatively oriented to writing or color bought coloring books, and use this activity as a beauty focus activity.  I was so proud of them making this choice!  What might be one such activity for you, to re-center yourself when you realize the world is too loud right now, and you need to still the spin?  

Let’s make a list!  I love lists!  Here we go…these are off the top of my head:

**Get up from what I am doing and go to another room in the house.

**Find an object where I find myself attracted, to concentrate on what is colorful, might bring in a good memory, maybe has a scent (or not) to focus upon.

**Get up and find some small thing to clean or re-organize that takes only a few minutes.

**Heat up some water and drink in the comfort.

**Look at a photo that makes you happy.

**Doodle on a piece of paper…even drawing lines every which way.

**Get out your calendar and pick a date and time to gift yourself even an hour doing something you love (This is what got me off the merry-go-round this time).  I am certain there are more that can be conjured…this is just to help you think of your own.

Beauty is everywhere!  Placing it in our lives daily is a great way to create a new ‘focus’ habit!  At the beginning of October, I began the practice of focusing upon gratitude each day by writing to a very short prompt about what I am grateful for.  At that time, I was feeling sad for our world.  Throughout this month I realize that this practice really works.  I love being with this new habit most evenings.  I have the chance to decorate the page I am working on, then write for only about five minutes.  That’s all I need…is just five minutes!  Feeling this gratitude just before bed helps me wake the next morning with a happier state of being.

What new ‘focus habit’ might you try?  Beauty, gratitude, Nature, science, flowers, animals…what might your focus points be?  These are but a few ways to just step off that spinning disc for even a few minutes.  Those few minutes could shift your Life perspective so quickly, and those few minutes can make all of the difference in these times!