Pam Bustin
creator, editor, story tender
Shake and Bake 25: The Working for the Weekend Edition
A week of … luxuriating in Serendipity and Simplicity.
Life is glorious, don’t you think?
And as I work this week on loosening up and stepping out of “schedule strictness” — I offer up this week’s shake and bake a day early in order to clear the decks for a laid back weekend.
The Quick Chicken (The Doings that help me with the Being):
- Walks: 11/6 (because shovelling COUNTS)
- Guitar: 3/6
- Yoga: 0/6 … cold…too cold.
- Meditation: 6/6
- Work on NIP: 6/6
THIS WEEK’S EXPERIMENT:
Some sort of SHORT “evening wrap up” – in the Scrib just to round out the day.
The Result:
I did it, I did it! I not only did it – I invented a sheet to do it on. So, I guess it isn’t actually actually in the Scrib – but … I found that doing the wee wrap up that I invented often led me back to the Scrib for a few moments.
The sheet I made is fun and playful… it is giving me ideas… for a THING. Keeping this under my hat for now.
Und… the rest of the week?
THE GNARBLY BITS of Mystery:
- – oh the cold. I know. so boring but it is wearing us to a nub. A nubby nub nub.
- – the crowding of too much “stuff” in our tiny home.
- – the leaking seeping madness – snow from above and frost from below and the shaky shack is SO not waterproof and we fear the consequences.
- – money fears..creeping in..suffocating… worries in the night. Oof on them. Oof on them, I say!
… HALT …
SHAKE EM OFF! SHAKE EM OFF!
THE TASTY Delightful BITS:
- + Finding a simple honest and lovely way to welcome Spring. Welcome Welcome Well Come!
- + Happy happy news for the Raggedy Man
- + Treatment for the tooth pain – though the big decision remains…
- + Anticipation of the trip the trip the trip… to a place with hot running bubble baths and maybe even a haircut and coffee shops and live theatre and a dinner with friends and pints at the pub and… oh such fun to dream on.
- + PLUS a train ride there and back – with SANDWICHES!
What worked? (THE THIng to bake in)
No surprise to anyone here….
SLOWING DOWN works.
Paying attention without grabbing grabbing grabbing on to things and clinging as though they are about to wrestle themselves from my slippery grip.
Realizing that the trick may well be in the listening and letting things SINK in.
How fabulous, right?
And… how absurdly difficult for this is for me..
I have always been huge on the note taking. I want to GRAB it all…write it down…capture it… keep it… Instead of just letting it sink sink sink in. I do not trust my memory. I do not trust my self to hold the information for more than a heartbeat.
Notes are all well and good, but what I’ve realized… or what I am wondering about is…
Is it perhaps more useful to just listen? To really focus on the person talking, open up to what they are saying and not be writing like a madwoman….racing ahead… trying to capture every word and missing words and…. it’s just so damned exhausting.
What will happen if I listen…as attentively as I can and then… just sit for a moment and imagine that what I’ve heard is being absorbed and will be there to recall when I need it? What would that look like?
A bit of practice on the “being present” front… maybe?
Next time I might…
breathe. listen. breathe. listen.
Try to head off the fear that I will LOSE something if I don’t write it down.
Know that the … whatever… the class – the wise words – the thing I am aiming to absorb WILL stay with me.
It will. If I really need it to.
NEXT WEEK’S Playful EXPERIMENT:
‘Twill be a week peopled with the people… friends and haps and hops… the experiment is to… indulge in the company of friends. To eat, drink and make merry. To walk new streets and see new sights. And to listen… hear and see…
That’s it for me… I’m off to do some dishes!
Happy trails to you all. May the snow… go… sooner than soon. And Spring emerge for reals.
go easy ~p
In homage to Havi’s Friday Chickens over on the The Fluent Self — This is the place I review my week – in an attempt to track some things – like progress on my novel and… living intentionally. I shake out my week and lay it out. Let the hard burn off and the good sink in. Call it an experiment in paying attention.
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Pam Bustin 