We’ve all had that day that isn’t “wrong” but somehow doesn’t feel right. We’ve all had the day that we look and sound fine to everyone else, but to ourselves, something is just OFF. Sometimes it feels like sadness for no reason or irritability or jumpiness. Mine can show up like that too, but the most common is not being able to keep all my cookies in a pile or a straight thought in my head. When this happens, I’m afraid to touch the door knob. I’m in fear that it will break off in my hand because everything I do is having a wonky outcome instead of being in flow.
Natalie says her version of OFF sometimes causes her to feel like she is missing something important. You know, sort of like when you get half way to work and realize that you have forgotten your phone or your purse? However, she hasn't forgotten an object. She has stepped out of herself and left a piece of her behind.
Before I understood how energy works, I just called it a bad day. I convinced myself it was out of my control and I would just rush home to be under the covers as quickly as possible. Now, when I feel that way I know what has happened. I’VE STEPPED OUT OF MYSELF.
You know what I mean, right? We live in a world that gives gold medals for busy. As women we step up to the plate whether it is in house shoes or stilettos. When I feel OFF I know that I have stepped out of my body because it isn’t a cool place to be anymore. In my body is my brain. It’s running a mile a minute, barking out orders and shaming me into doing more. In my body is my broiled and crispy self trying to keep up.
Sometimes in my “Self” there is something I need to look at, something I need to feel or something I need to face that...I just don’t wanna (said in my best 5 year old voice). I step out of myself and put everything on “automatic”.
Odd thing is that it will work beautifully for a bit. It feels like relief and a polyester sense of calm. It works until I realize that what felt like calm was just stepping away from my own noise. But now I have nowhere to stand. I feel off balance, off center and sort of…empty. Again, it’s all because I’ve stepped out of myself.
So how do you fix that? You step back into yourself, but you make it a safe place to be first. The last time this happened to me I was working with Natalie at her house. I just couldn’t get my pile of cookies to stay on the plate. Being the wise sister she is she asked, “What do you need?” In painful honesty I said, “I have no idea , but I need to figure it out.” I stepped out on her wonderful granny style porch with a piece of notebook paper. At the top I wrote, “What the hell is going on?”
I put numbers down the left of the page and just wrote simple five word or less sentences about absolutely anything that was weighing on me. There were large things and small things. There were interesting things and dumb, boring things. There were exciting things and things I just didn’t want to think about. There were physical things and emotional things. Point is…there were THINGS and all of these things were having an effect on my sense of balance, my sense of self awareness and self care.
Yes, I had puked up my anxiety on the blue lines of college ruled paper. Now to sit with each thing, acknowledging the part of me that was tired, that was concerned and that was bummed out. Oddly enough, this made room for another part of me, a part that needed expression.
About that time a summer downpour began. So what did I do? I did what any awesome 7 year old would do. I STEPPED OFF THE PORCH!
I stepped out into the rain and let it wash all the “grown-up” off of me. I let it calm the woman who needed control and would prefer as much perfection as would fit in her purse. I just stood in the rain, and then I walked in the rain and then I played in the rain. All was again well in my world, maybe not THE world but my world. It was again safe to step back into MYSELF. It was calm, clean and a place to start over. It felt like “ME”. I was totally back in my body and all those things on the piece of paper, were just a list of things, and not part of who I am.
Yes…finally…back home in my body, centered, balanced and feeling good again. So how about you? How do you know when you have stepped out of yourself and how do you find your way back ? How do you fix a bad day?