Take a Deep Breath, and BEGIN AGAIN

So, when I first started writing this blog post, my content was going to revolve around dealing with the myriad of ideas that flow my way on any given day.  It seemed like  a suitable subject; the last few weeks I’ve found myself to be inundated with a whack of ideas — a never-flowing stream of ideas — and determining what to entertain has felt challenging.  So I started — and finished — writing that post, and hit “PUBLISH”, only to realize that while I was typing, without my cluing in, my internet connection had been lost.  Which meant that my entire blog post, which I assumed was being automatically saved as I typed (which is what usually happens), was lost.  Gone.  May as well not have been entered at all.  Very, very frustrating.

What I realized, once I got over my initial frustration, was that this sort of thing happens.  Sometimes, it looks like my experience did — you lose something you thought you had.  Or, you can’t find it.  Or in other variations of the theme,  a client you were counting on decides to go elsewhere.  Or something you wanted to buy is out of stock when you get to the store.  Plans you were looking forward to fall through.  Life is filled with supposed set-backs, curve balls, surprises.  However you frame it, these things can throw you off, at least momentarily.  The question is, what do you do with that experience?

Well, it feels to me like I’m learning and relearning this lesson a lot.  Which I’m guessing is a good thing.  At the very least, it allows me to pass my learnings on to you.  In this context, I could easily have decided that the universe didn’t want me to write a post today, and let it go.  I think it would have been a valid course of action, and I could have moved on to other items on my to-do list.  Alternatively, I could have thrown in the towel and decided that I should just go back to bed and take the day off.   A little extreme possibly, but still an option.  Thirdly, I could have tried to recreate the original article; indeed I did try that for about 2 minutes, but when the frustration got to be unbearable, I let that idea go too.  What I did choose to do in the end, was take a deep breath (actually, 5-10 deep breaths), and start again.  As I allowed myself to entertain the idea of starting fresh, as I let go of the need to rewrite what I had written the first time, new ideas and possibilities opened up.  I felt my anxiety dissipate, and found that I could move on.  It wasn’t in the direction that I originally anticipated, and it was okay.  It was more than okay.  It got me unstuck.

Bottom-line:  having to begin again can feel ridiculously frustrating.  My sense is that when you allow yourself to take a deep breath first, and then begin again, what you’re actually doing is clearing the space for new stuff.  So while the title of this post would suggest that the emphasis is on beginning again, what I really want is for you to understand the importance of breathing through the process.  The deep breathing is what will facilitate the beginning again, making everything come out alright in the end.