What Counts?

This Sunday morning I snuggled my child, made coffee, had a nice long chat with my husband, sent my father a note, gave text props to my sisters, and answered a couple of emails. I looked into grocery delivery service for someone I think could use it and then realized they probably don’t think they could use it so didn’t send.

But none of that counts, because what I didn’t do, what I meant to do, but somehow didn’t do, was write my little deep thoughts for the book I think I’m writing. And that’s the only thing that counts, in my mind. Or in one rut of my mind.

So, from that rutted place, everything else I do or have done is, not bad exactly, but not good either. Like filler. Like a waste. 

Except that filler waste stuff is my life and my moments and my time, so either I better start counting it or pack up and take a trip to that solitary mountaintop, that cabin in the woods which for me might be more realistically a nice hotel with room service ... but anyway, a place where there’s space, more space, to be in that roomy roominess. The cliched lone artist in her zone, unhampered by mortal encumbrances.

It’s not happening. I don’t want it to happen. I like being here, I like being with my peeps, being connected. This is my purpose, right now, this close relationship with my family, this being available. It counts. 

And if a book or a painting or a something like that can emerge from the scraps of time in the daily, then great. But this black-white, productive vs. non-productive, external accomplishment-seeking mindset is eating my joy. So rather than feed it accomplishments, of which there are never enough to satisfy, I’m gonna recognize it for what it is, another version of not-good-enough-itis, another voice of Evie, self-loathing, and let it go. 

It all counts. I count, living as I am, doing what I do, offering what I offer, the way I offer it. And not more, not different, than that. It’s okay, it is what it is. I am what I am. I’m gonna keep going.

www.livingeveryminuteofit.com