This blog is difficult for me to write this month due to the difficult uncertainty we all face living through a pandemic. The majority of us are scared and worried about our health, safety, and financial security. Everyday the news, the stock market, the state of our hospitals, and our concerns for our friends and families are at the forefront of our attention. We are living in our vulnerability day by day as we learn to adapt to this “new normal”.
Even though I’m scared, worried, and vulnerable at this time; hoping my loved ones stay healthy and I won’t have to borrow money from my parents to pay for my Brooklyn apartment; I still believe in balance, perspective, and vision. It’s often during the lows that we as people have the most opportunity to rise above for the greater good anconnect with a vision that’s larger than ourselves.
Because like many of us, I have been gifted more free time than I’ve ever had before. Time to stop, time to reflect, time to regroup. If there can be any silver lining found during this time; it’s the gift of time. Because of this new space gifted to us many of us find ourselves facing our unfulfilling jobs, relationships, situations, and world views with no distractions and no places to hide.
Coming face to face with the problems in our lives, the stuff that’s not working is difficult and frustrating but it’s also inspiring and can bring forth a vision for your life you had no idea you had. Buddhist teacher Jon Kabat-Zinn talks about meditation in this way but I think it rings true for any vision you have for your life, your community, or world. Kabat says; If you hope to bring meditation into your life in any kind of long-term committed way, you will need a vision that is truly your own-one that is deep and tenacious and that lies close to the core of who you believe yourself to be, what you value in your life, and where you see yourself going. Only the strength of such a dynamic vision and the motivation from which it springs can possibly keep you on this path year in and year out.
I think Kabat is trying to express the power and clarity that having a well expressed vision can provide. Having vision can inspire anyone to achieve anything as long as it’s in alignment with a deep seated, from the core, heart wrenching vision. The greatest thinkers, leaders, and innovators of our time have been people with enormous visions and now more than ever we need the drive and enormity of each individual’s soul centered vision to become a reality.
It’s time to be bigger than our fear and take this pause to look inward, to go deeper, to stand on the edges and decide what world we want to live in post pandemic. We can think of this time as a curse or we can think of it as a wake-up call. The choice is ours; we need more thought leaders, conscious businesses owners, artists, innovators, and creatives to drive us forward and ignite the shared humanity we crave. The bad jobs, bad relationships, toxic behaviors, and old thinking need to go; we can’t solve a pandemic with the same thinking and situations that ignited it in the first place.
Mother nature has pressed pause and given us all the time to think, meditate, and pray. This is not a light time but it has the capacity for enormous personal change and growth with the hope we can better impact our communities. If you don’t have a firm grasp on that deep seated vision now is the time to make the space for it to come through, to be seen, heard, and resonated. If you already have that vision now is the time to plan, take action, and implement. We have the space and the time, it’s our responsibility to literally make dreams a reality.
What to do now?
I can’t tell you exactly what to do to make your visions a reality. We all have our own unique paths to navigate but many of the greats have found clarity in silence, meditation, movement, writing, and prayer. Often the answers are closer than we think, look for inspiration around you and from within and you will be well on your way. Tapping into a purpose that’s meaningful, important, and inspiring is way closer than we think and is often ignited by just taking one small baby step. Let’s stop sprinting and start running a marathon. Let’s make work, careers, relationships, and communities that can stand the test of time, let’s make a world we can sustain motivated by our visions.
Recommended Jon Kabit Zinn Books:
Coming To Our Senses: Healing Ourselves and The World Through Mindfulness