I had several ideas this morning about what I would do today for a first. As it happened, my first found me, or more accurately, it unfolded for me as the day progressed. I shared during the Keller Williams sales meeting this morning about how doing my year of firsts is teaching me to live more in the flow. When an intended new experience doesn’t quite work out, I’ve learned to keep going and seek another first, and always, another appears for me.
The short talks I share at Keller Williams are lessons that come directly out of my life. The benefit for me is that my own words also remind me of what is true. Speaking about being in the flow created a heightened awareness for me today of how easy it is to balk against what is going on in my life, creating resistance. Thinking about releasing, allowing, moving, letting go of the past, not projecting into the future, being very present in the moment and finding joy there, immediately shifted my day and it became all about flowing. Go With the Flow Day was birthed.
What a beautiful day it was. Clients and requests for information flowed in and connection and information flowed back. Not one, not two, but three unplanned trips to three different garden centers appeared as I flowed, and I found a wonderful selection of plants and flowers. As the day flowed on, there was time for a lunch meeting, house searches online for a new buyer, space to co-create a class via a conference call, and a lovely late afternoon session in the garden planting ornamental grasses. Never during the day was there a sense of needing to do more than I was doing at that exact moment, or of needing to hurry, fret or multitask.
Life is like a river, and I am paddling in my little boat merrily down the stream, until I encounter the rapids of things not going the way I want them to. Then I have choices: I can resist flow and begin paddling upstream in defiance, expending huge amounts of energy while I go nowhere or make very little progress. That wears me out, quickly. Or, I can struggle to shore and camp out there. I’m not exerting the energy but I’ve removed myself from flow and I’m allowing life to move on past me while I live in denial. Being disengaged and watching from the sidelines allows loneliness and bitterness to set up camp with me. Or, I can ride out the rapids and go with the flow. I am moving with the river, my energy in sync with life, open to where the experience will take me. One thing I’ve learned over the past few years is that any situation the flow takes me to is temporary. The flow will take me beyond that as well, if I will allow it to.
And Beyond is where I am headed this year. No expectations, no disappointments, no fear. Instead, there is movement, adventure, joy. There is flow.
