If you find yourself 

Waiting...

For this time to pass

For when we’ll get back

To normal

Or “new normal,”

If you find yourself 

Saying that this is only temporary,

This too shall pass,

Just make it through

Until then.

Remember that now IS the time

Only now.

This moment

Is just as much your life

As the one you had before 

And the one you’re waiting for

So what would you do now?

What would you do today,

YES, 

In these very conditions,

To make this life

Your best life?

There, here, now, you will find yourself.

- - - - - - - - - - - 

It is incredibly important to know that things will continue to change and that we will return to something more familiar to the bits and pieces, places and people, routines and habits that made up our previous life. There’s hope in that vision.

But it’s equally, if not more, important to remember that the time is now. Now is now. There is hope, presently.

I’ve been realizing that I’ve sort of hit this weird pause button on life (necessarily) that has kept me from fully dropping in and owning some of the pieces of my life - mostly the bits that I’m having the most resistance to being as they are - different than I want them to be.

But I shifted recently, after some serious heaviness lifted, in recognition that I was putting on hold things that bring me joy, fulfillment, and happiness.

Today, it was a semi-planned but mostly spontaneous day trip with my family out to the York River to play in the sand, find treasures, and have a windy, chilly picnic lunch.

And also making the time for a phone call with a friend while baking two, from-scratch, crazy birthday cakes for my twins who turn 9 tomorrow.

There is so much that is hard and tragic and strained and intense right now. And there’s also love and happiness and connection and softness and life, in all of its forms.

What can you do to make now the best it can be? To make now joyful? To make now sweet? To make now softer and more connected?