Whenever you start to feel the pressure to do more,
as your shoulders tense up with stress,
and your jaw tightens as you push
your way right through
your need for rest,
turn your face
to the nearest window.
Catch a glimpse of a cloud.
A leaf in the wind.
Let everything in you soften
as you notice
these natural rhythms
too easily forgotten.
We demand so much of
ourselves,
we forget about the way of the trees,
we forget that before flowers bloomed they were seeds,
only springing up in season,
never telling us the plans or reasons
for why they grow the way they grow,
and yet, when we look at them we know,
there is fullness to their becoming
unconcerned with human notions
of productivity and perfection,
rooted in connection,
in-tune to something more.
Oh, how easily we forget
in our rush from one thing to the next
that despite what we’ve been told,
we have built in rhythms of rest,
and slow, beautiful progress,
slow.
Slowly,
we grow
one day
at a time.
We realize the wholeness of it all.
and leave the pursuit of perfection behind.
- MHN
