Twelve seconds from this morning's storm.
Daily Notes, From the Editor
(416 words)
Waking up is wondering. Will I get it all done? What will today bring?
As I write, it is early afternoon and the sky is blue, air is calm. A mere three hours ago we had a windstorm, though. There was rain, bluster, and cold. I woke to the sound of drops and branches moving erratically outside my window.
“I’ve been practicing a new thought upon waking: ”There is enough time. I have enough time. I have enough.””
It has been a long time since I took a yoga class. Months, in fact. Several of them. Every Wednesday I lift weights with Amanda. Every Sunday I work out with a group of women she gathers. We lift together and laugh together, and I am getting strong. My body loves its newfound strength. And my body is also begging me to become supple again.
Supple like the bamboo outside my bedroom window in the wind; so very strong, so very beautiful, and so very yielding. So very feminine.
Who works in a masculine-driven world? I do. All week long. Corporate communications for innovative technology companies is about moving fast and thinking big and meeting deadlines and getting the right words into emails and onto websites, and doing it all right now. It is being in our heads. Surviving in this world has meant being removed from the feminine.
How do we come back? Where do we find balance?
“Femininity is not all pink cashmere and eyelash batting.”
Feminine power is moving slow and thinking strategically. It is partnership and connection. It is feeling. It is keen intuition, which can only be understood if we know how to listen to our bodies. Femininity is a strong, supple lioness.
I stumbled downstairs and puttered, putting laundry in the machine (who does that first thing?), cleaning kitchen countertops, blinking my eyes awake and opening window shades to the storm. I made tea in the morning light. I lit a candle. I found my camera. I carried it with a blanket upstairs. I found child's pose and stayed like that for a long series of breaths. I let my body draw me like molasses through the movements it remembers doing, in a different body, not so long ago...when I had less muscle and more breeze.
I breathed into this new one.
"There is enough time. I have enough time. I have enough."
Out the window, the blustery substance of my body-prayer met with the swaying bamboo in the storm, and I smiled. Saturday unfolded, merging my two seemingly disparate qualities into one.
xo
laura
Laura Lowery is the founder, editor and publisher of Lucia. She does her best to lead a creative life. Whether triumphant or stumbling, Laura shares daily notes (that are often weekly) here on luciajournal, including stories, behind-the-scenes happenings, little doses of inspiration, and large quantities of curiosity and heart. She is pleased to meet you.