Time for the soul

Most of us at some point in our lives have worked at maximum capacity. We’ve put in some long days, maybe for weeks at a time. We’ve gone without enough sleep and no down time. Once in a while, it doesn’t hurt to push ourselves a bit.

It’s important to remember that can’t go on forever. People are adaptable, but we aren’t machines. Constant striving takes its toll. It might be a gradual wearing down, or it could be a massive heart attack. Even car engines can’t run full speed all the time without breaking. If your only days off are due to sick days, there’s something wrong in your life.

Americans don’t take vacations; not like their European counterparts. Have we all been brainwashed? Are we afraid we don’t know what to do with free time? Perhaps if we had a couple months off from our regular lives, we wouldn’t want to go back?

For a number of years, my lovely wife worked in a hospital located in a vacation destination town. Most of their patients were on holiday. The hospital workers would often remark that it was like when a person went on vacation, they finally had the time to be sick. Maybe they were sick all along and were too busy working to notice. As soon as their engines shut down, they fell apart.

Perhaps part of their illness was spiritual. If we are spiritual at all, it’s scheduled for the sabbath, between 10 and 11 AM.. There’s no time to sit among the trees and gaze out over the water. People really need to quiet the outside world to hear themselves think. We also have to go beyond thinking and just be. Experience the universe. I’m not saying that religion doesn’t have its place, but don’t let it be your whole spiritual life. God and the universe are unscripted.

Our lives need unscheduled down time. If we have to live with less material goods to do so, then we have to simplify our lives. It’d be a darn shame to be on our death beds and realize we never cultivated our soul, the only thing we’ll take with us.

-Sixbears