Sitting in its massive cradle of arms, back and seat, I wondered out loud, “Why does it keep rocking?”
“Because you’re little”, like that was an answer.
You could curl up in the seat of my grandmother’s rocker and once you got it moving it would keep moving up for a surprisingly long time… long time in kid-terms.
A massive piece of wooden furniture that could only be moved to wherever it was needed by someone grown-up and strong. It seemed to just wait quietly and patiently. And, like a gnarly old tree waiting to be climbed, it would gently wake up when you climbed aboard.
I don’t know what happened to it. In later years when the old folks moved to a new house, there was another big wooden rocking chair but, lacking the weight and balance, it didn’t get my attention.
“Why didn’t it rock like it should?” I wondered out loud. I didn’t get an answer to that question, either.
Finding our own rhythms
Much like that old rocking chair, you have a natural momentum that you can work with if you are attuned to it. Your body has a time table and spending effort will take less effort if you work with what you are naturally given. Take a page in your journal and mark times in the day and night when you find working or creative thought is most productive. Are there times when you are often pleased or uplifted in some way. The 24-hour clock favors certain organic energetic expressions, according to ancient traditional medicine. For example, the time for the liver is 1:00 to 3:00 AM. Normally we are asleep during those hours and the liver is working automatically in the background. But if you find this is a time when you wake, you will probably be spending the time planning something, and emotionally, it can be a time of agitation. Planning and vision is a talent attributed to the energy of liver.
You can gain insight and work with your rhythms if you use your patterns as a map of your personal energetic clock.
As you learn more about your rhythms, here are some of the questions you will be able to answer:
- What time of the day do you find you smile easier?
- When do you find old acquaintances pop up in your memory?
- When do you feel surges of energy?
- When do you need a nap?
- What is going on in the two hours before you feel troubled?
- When does your body temperature fluctuate?
Feeling good, understanding your ebbs and flows, acts of healthy eating, and moving with joy are basic self-care skills. Reclaiming our nature does more than prevent escalating problems. It also reverses many unwanted errors.
You could push through and ignore your inner nature, but whatever your age, you are too young for that. I hope you can catch future problems now. Some call it pre-habilitation. I call it "enjoying the ride".
