A Time to Carry Less

Over the last few weeks I have been able to pick up some hours subbing dance classes. Some of the genre’s I teach all of the time while others, like hip hop I am not great at. Regardless, I show up with my phone which has the music and notes from their teachers, my water, and I teach. I don’t need much, and more often than not all goes very well. I do not need a lot to do what I love to do.

At the beginning of March, I wanted to get a new small purse and tote bag. I also bought an extra zipper bag. I have always thought of my purse as somewhere I can go that will have anything I might need at any given moment. It wasn’t until recently that I was getting tired of carrying everything around with me everywhere. My purse now has my wallet, Kleenex, chapstick, hand sanitizer, one hair tie, and gum. That is it. I have my zip bag in my car with all of the other things that I had been carrying in my purse. I have needed to pull that out and use things from it at a couple moments this month, but more often than not I was carrying so many things every day that I did not use every day.

I do have a tote for each job that I put my purse inside of, but the physical amount of stuff that I am carrying each day has greatly decreased. If I every really need something, I will have it with my at home or in my car.

I realized that I also need to do this kind of organizing in my life with my thoughts and worries. These things are not as easy to simple zip up and let them be, but I am getting better about praying about them and telling a friend or family member about them. Talking through my thoughts and worries has helped me carry them less.

Living alone, being more introverted than extroverted, and having many friends with children or who live far away makes it challenging sometimes to speak what I need to hear myself say out loud. — These are my circumstances. You may have different ones that make you feel isolated, alone, walls up. We all have power to build up our own walls no matter where we are in life. Finding safe spaces to put a door in the walls, or plain nock the walls down is going to take time. Be brave enough to notice or ask friends to help you to know when to come on the other side of the walls.

I am so grateful for my friends who have been helping me speak my thoughts, let out some tears, and process what I can do next. Reaching out to friends or family and asking for help can be really hard. Life feels so much less like a burden when you get some help lifting all that you feel you need to carry.

What can you tell a close friend or family member today that you have been carrying alone? What is making you feel heavy and alone?

We can notice when we start to feel like we are sinking, sank, sunk.

We can name what is making us feel heavy like a burden.

We can pray about it.

We can reach out and ask a friend to coffee to talk about it.

Your friend may also have a burden that they need to share, too. Someone just needs to speak first.

*Do not compare your burden with your friends. You both may have a similar burden, but if they are different do not undermine your friend’s burden because it seems light to you. What may be light to you may be heavy for them. Listen. Let them know their feelings are valid, too.

We can seek professional help. Therapists are out there, and they want to help you. Seek the help.

Once you tell one person, it will be easier to also talk to other friends and family about it. Hearing yourself speak out loud that you need a change, you are feeling a certain way, or what ever it may be is powerful. Writing in a journal may also work for you to process thoughts you didn’t know you needed to get out of your head. I often write lines and think – whoa, I did not know I was feeling this way until I stopped thinking so hard and just let my heart and hand talk with less of my head getting in the way. Same with talking with friends, or family – speak from your heart and you will get deeper than if you stay talking from your head.

**Not every person you meet or know is going to be safe to be vulnerable like this with. Some people, like this season’s cast of Survivor, are going to share your secrets and use them against you trying to save themselves. Sadly it is the way of the world. Be smart about who you trust, because there are good people out there, too.

I pray that over time you find people you can feel safe with, or who come into your life bringing you into their safe space. Let other’s help you with your burdens. God is always listening, and always wanting to help you with anything and everything. Pray to Him. Ask for His guidance. You will see it if you look for it. It may not be in the next minute, but in the next days, be persistent in your prayer and you will see a difference. Carry less on your own and you will feel more like yourself. We often start to loose ourselves when we are carrying too much.

My prayer this week has been: Let me be glad to be here. Help me to know that everything is temporary. Let me be capable of loving more. Thank you for carrying the cross for me.

-Em

If you need a place to write and let go of what is too heavy for you, send me an email at atimeforeverything.art.blog@gmail.com and I will pray for you.