Mindfulness

Last weekend at church, we did a mindfulness exercise. You are supposed to envision yourself on a hike with a backpack full of things from the past. The backpack is weighing you down so you stop and rest. You unload everything from your backpack. Then you have to decide what to put back before you continue on your way. It was more elaborate, with more details, than that, but that was the gist of it.

Afterwards, we discussed everything. What the path we were on looked like. The place where we chose to stop and rest. What we took out of our backpack. And what we chose to put back in. How we felt walking the rest of the trail with a lighter pack.

Most everyone said they took rocks out of their packs. Some of the rocks had words. Others were just representations of things from the past. And as they chose what to return to their backpack and continue on the journey with, everyone felt lighter- as if a weight had literally been lifted from them.

Except me. My vision was very different from the others. I was walking along a path, as everyone was, and my backpack was heavy. But when I stopped to rest and unload my bag, I didn't pull on rocks. I pulled out people. Past friendships and relationships and all their baggage as well. I also pulled out objects that represented things from the past or even feelings about hard things. I should have felt a lot better after that. The load should have been much lighter. But as I sat there trying to decide what to leave behind and what to take with me, I was frozen. I knew the things that I needed to leave. There were plenty of things that were dragging me down. But I also didn't know how to leave those things. I felt like they were part of me and I didn't know who I was without them. So instead of packing up and moving forward, I stayed behind. I stayed stuck in the moment of rest trying to decide what I could go forward without and who I would be without those things.

And that's where I feel like I am in life right now. Frozen in time, unable to move forward. I feel as if I'm tethered to a bungee cord. I can only move forward so far. At a certain point, it starts getting harder to move against the tension of the cord. And then it becomes impossible, until eventually it will shoot me backwards and I'll be back where I started. The things is, I have the key to release myself, but I just can't do it. I don't know why. And I do know why all at the same time. But that doesn't make it any easier.

I have been praying through this for a while. The struggles continue and so do the prayers. Join me. Pray for me. Pray with me. Ask me how I'm doing with all this. (I may or may not answer...)