A Giving Heart

Melted broken crayons, a photo by springknitter on Flickr.

A week ago patience was on my mind. On days where I truly felt patient in my heart there was a sensation of peace and contentment. Outer forces could not penetrate my patient, happy heart.

Today however I feel like everything is penetrating that peaceful bubble. Am I lacking patience? Yes a little, but mostly having carried those lessons with me from last week I'm burdened by something different.

Insurmountable lists of tasks, piles of stuff disorganized in boxes, endless dishes in my sink, and an over abundance of "stuff'" in my life feel like a 75 lb weight on my shoulders.

I took a few moments to myself tonight to breakdown the battles I've been dealing with today. All I could come up with is there's too much to do and not enough time, help, or energy to do it all.

Something told me to do something relaxing and forget all the tasks for a while. Naturally I took a shower! Isn't that when our greatest revelations happen? Well mine always do and today was no different.

I was washing my excessively long hair, thinking about which of the many comfortable clothes I should wear when I get out, and deciding if I should wash all of my many favorite dishes in my kitchen. Or perhaps I should organize the 5 boxes of crafts and yarn or dust off all the wonderful new lamps, dressers and chairs that were given to us for free.

Suddenly I was very aware of the abundance in my home. Why do I need all these things? And why do I let them make my life heavier?

Further into this realization I thought about what it means to give. It felt good to think about giving because giving seemed just the opposite of stewing in all my stuff! I spend so much time worrying about what to do with all my stuff that I cloud the more important things going on around me.

I don't feel as though I am meant to give away all that I own. But it really opened my eyes that having things all around me was actually impeding on my clarity and peace. I think this is a good segue into something I've been wanting to write about for a while and that is Giving. Giving naturally comes in many forms and sometimes we need to focus on relinquishing what we have to reclaim the freedom in our hearts.

As frustrated and overwhelmed as I felt today I am really glad I got to the point of needing to figure out what was happening in my heart. Conflict always leads me to beautiful resolutions.

I'll try to relate a lot of what I do this week back to what I think it means to have a giving heart. Just as a patient heart is peaceful and content I think a giving heart leads us to a similar state of happiness.

BPositive and BGiving!

Love,
B