Today I was trying to figure out why I felt so bored with my daily existence. I know, yes, we are hitting the ground running from the start, with no warm-up. I could tell that I was grateful for my overall life, but everything felt very blah. I saw a TikTok video of someone who was speaking on romanticizing their life, and I was like, how the hell do I do that?
I have spent a large portion of my life in fight or flight mode, where my nervous system was always in an elevated state. At some point, I transitioned into what I like to call "The Glory Years" when I lived in California. This is when I exchanged my trauma-filled existence for an exhilarating adrenaline rush lifestyle...do you see where I am going with this yet? I was hiking along cliffsides, and ziplining through jungles in distant countries. I went from high adrenaline and activated nervous system via trauma to one activated through adrenaline junkie activities. No wonder I feel like life is boring, I'm used to living with a highly activated nervous system regardless of whether it is good or bad. Now that things are calm, I don't know how to interact and engage with "life." I started to notice that when people were romanticizing their lives, it was the simplest things like, morning tea using their favorite cup sitting by a window, or listening to music while burning candles and incense while they work on a DIY project. That was when it hit me. There is a difference between living life with gratitude vs. living in gratitude. One is living your life and there are points throughout your day, week, months, or year where you have an overwhelming sense of gratitude yet the remaining days feel "blah". The other is where you are actively living your life in gratitude every moment of the day, week, month, or year. Here's an example. Normally I have moments in my day where I give thanks for something I'm grateful for. Recently we had a really bad hurricane touch down along the east coast. During that time, I worked from home as it made its way through our area. While I was going about my normal day-to-day activities, I would see something where someone was affected by the storm. Let's use the example of an apartment complex that got completely flooded out. In turn, it would remind me of how fortunate I am. I would send up a quick prayer for those affected and give thanks and gratitude for my power still being on, and my home being safe and dry, and would then proceed to go on about my day. I was living with gratitude. What I found is that when you are so grateful for all that you have and are, regardless of what is or isn't happening around you, you live in a constant state of gratitude. You live your life in gratitude by honoring, focusing, and actively participating in the existence that you are grateful for. You wake up fully aware of the blessing of having a bed, covers, and pillows so you enjoy taking care of your bed and making it up. You are actively enjoying resetting your bed when you get up because you live in constant gratitude for it all. To live in gratitude vs. with gratitude is a complete understanding that what you have and are is a blessing that deserves to have your full attention and celebration. So now I get it! To romanticize your life is to focus on and celebrate all of the beauty and greatness that your current life holds. To live in a constant state of appreciating, observing, and recognizing all things big and small that you are grateful for. If you spend your days, acknowledging, celebrating, and taking care of all the gifts that you are blessed to have in your life, from running water to having a job, from a roof over your head to that one person you love and who loves you (platonic or nonplatonic), then you would in turn live a life in gratitude.
Living life with gratitude can sometimes make you feel stuck in your day-to-day regardless of the gratitude you sprinkle throughout the year. Especially if you constantly navigate towards the thoughts of what you don't have, or even worse, comparing yourself and life to others and what they do have. At the end of it all, there are many decisions that we do have the power to make concerning our lives, and those decisions, no matter how big or small, can make a HUGE difference in how we experience life as a whole. It's time to use new insight and see life differently, but more importantly, experience life differently. See you on the other side.
Love you lots! - Sacred
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