Being Here in the age of Corona, election, madness, strife, stupidity, ignorance, great love and compassion is exhausting. It’s soul-fatiguing. We continue to fight. We continue to say the same things louder because we imagine there is some soul sitting in “the back” waiting for our words of wisdom to be spoken louder. Maybe there is. Who knows anymore.

What I have for you today is this: figure out what you need.

I ran across this post from Danielle LaPorte a few days ago and she not so subtly named the difference between needing and deserving. I tend to conflate the two. Do you?

She said,
“Rest because you need it.⁣
(Notice I didn’t say “deserve it.” Rest is not something we need to earn.)⁣”

And I was at once enlightened and confounded. What other needs am I equating with deserving, which means I need to earn it, or have earned it? How are our views putting others in those perilous places, too?

Rest is a need. Nourishment and healthy food is a need. Creativity is a need for a human to be fully well and alive. Love and connection is a need.I would venture to say fulfillment is a need. Safety, both in your home and in your community is a need.

All of this reminds me of a Neon Trees song that goes like this:

You are never gonna get
Everything you want in this world
First things first
Get what you deserve

Now I am considering, first things first, get what you NEED.

We have discovered in this time of uncertainty that we don’t need all the things we thought we did, we simply confused our self-determined deserving for a need.

We believe we needed to get our nails done.
We believe we needed  to get our hair cut and/or colored.
We believe that we needed Amazon to deliver in 2 days or less, others be damned.

These are desires, they are even items we believe we are entitled to and possibly we are. But we do not NEED them to survive or, daresay, even thrive. I went three whole months and didn’t get my hair cut or colored.
Did it look the way I wanted? No.
Did I NEED it to be the way I wanted to survive or thrive? No.
Was it still uncomfortable for me in some ways? 100% yes.

It is interesting how willingly we will deny ourselves things we truly need to survive and thrive but put in their place things we think we deserve. We will trade the need of good sleep for watching a full series on Netflix in one sitting. We will forego healthy food for the reward of a doughnut because we did something we believe is worthy of it.

This isn’t a rant on Netflix or Hulu or whatever your form of entertainment happens to be. It’s a commentary on how confused and conflicted we all are at times. And we are still in a period of time where we can get our minds right.

To some extent our lives have not returned to the same level of pace and interaction and regardless of your opinion on that, there is this space. Students of A Course in Miracles might refer to this as a Holy Instant, it’s a moment where we move our ego aside and move with our soul.

When we are contemplating the overwork, overindulgence, procrastination there is part of us that knows the path that will lead us home, not necessarily always to comfort, but home to ourselves. And we frequently ignore it for what we feel we deserve.

Maybe we can stop hustling for rest, nourishment, and care. And further yet, maybe we can stop expecting others to do the same. What you need may not be what you think you deserve but we’ve been uncertain about so much in 2020, maybe we could be willing to relearn the basics too.

Sunshine & Sarcasm,
Lowi & G