Making It Through

by Jeanette R. Harrison

It’s Saturday night on a three day holiday weekend. I’m sitting at home alone with my little dog, Mosie. I am reflecting back on my day as I get ready to do my daily gratitude practice. I am trying to think of 10  things I am grateful for today and why. I started doing this every day after reading the book, “The Magic,” by Rhonda Byrne. Some days, I have a lot to be grateful for. So much so that the 10 things I am grateful for come flying out of my head, almost faster than I can write them down. Other days, finding 10 things to be grateful for is a bit harder. Today was one of those days.

I didn’t have a terrible day. Not at all. It was actually quite relaxing. I woke up and spent most of the morning lounging in my pajamas, drinking coffee, cooking myself breakfast, and picking up around my home. I had a pleasant morning. It was an acceptable morning. For a Saturday, I would give it three out of five stars. Why not five stars? Because it is a holiday weekend, and I am spending it alone. 

I know there are some Law of Attraction people (and I do study the Law of Attraction) who may think that stating I don’t like spending the holidays alone will only make me spend more holidays alone. Abraham Hicks suggests that when we say what we don’t want, we are sending out “rockets of desire” for what we do want. I get told I should just be grateful I have a little dog and food in my refrigerator and a home to live in. All the same, it doesn’t make me as happy as I could be. I feel like I deserve to have an enjoyable weekend and spend time with people as much as anyone else. 

In order to combat these feelings of loneliness and grief I did a couple of things. First, I tried to find things to do during the day. I made a little plan for myself of how I was going to make it through the day. Part of that plan was taking time out to meditate.

Meditating does help. I often joke to people I spend the weekends looking at the inside of my eyelids, but I actually spend time on the  weekends meditating. At my day job, I listen to other people’s problems mostly all day every day. I am a very empathetic person, so my inner self can feel overwhelmed at times. Even on my breaks at work, I take time out to meditate. At home on the weekends, I meditate as much as I can, some days for a couple of hours. 

I find that meditating clears my mind and improves my mood. I may meditate with no sound, and simply sit in a chair and listen to the sounds of my home and let my mind clear itself. I also do guided meditations. Right now, I am using the Innercise app. I also use meditations on YouTube. The most useful part of the meditations is that they help me get through the difficult feelings I may be having at the time. Today, that feeling was isolation and loneliness, which can feel like a pile of bricks placed on the center of my chest. Meditation doesn’t make that suffocating, pressured, heart-crushing feeling go away, but it does make the feeling lighter. It makes those heavy bricks feel like they weigh one pound instead of 100 pounds each. It lightens my mood and helps me move on with my day. It helps me to focus to get tasks done that I otherwise may not do.

I meditated in the late afternoon today. Afterward, I did some laundry, I cooked myself dinner, I went for a walk, and I filmed a video. Then, I came home and walked my dog, and I am writing this post. Now, I am ready to write down the 10 things I am most grateful for today. My meditation is one of those 10 things.