Today for Lunch
So much of my life thus far has been serving others and continually feeling like I have to put my needs on the back burner. As a woman, I live with a lot of not enough-ness. The feeling that I’m never accomplished enough in my day and I always should be currently or should have been doing more, more, more, more, more.
My to-do list, as I’m sure yours too, is very long and seemingly never ends. Once I get a task accomplished, there’s seven others behind it, taking its place. There’s always something to be done around here.
Typically, I spend my days eating my lunch standing up. I live on the road in my bus with my family as a nomad, living and traveling all across the country. To earn an income, we do various things. We’re a firm believer in having several streams of income so when one gets cut off, you have others until you’re able to replace the one you lost.
This means I’m mom, partner, jenn, author, video creator, financial planner, housekeeper, mediator, referee, and so many other hats I wear throughout the day. Some make money, some keep the family balanced and running, usually all of them doing something for someone else.
Today though, I spent lunch solely for me.
Feeling frazzled, I knew I needed to take a breath. Kyle, my partner was on a trip to South Dakota which meant I was solo parenting for a couple days. I was wrapping up mediating two of our three kids having an argument about who gets the last AAA batteries for their TV remote.
Once I got them separated and settled, my tummy was grumbling and ready for lunch. I took a few steps into our seventies inspired green kitchen and opened the fridge door. I really wasn’t sure what I even wanted. After a few moments of mulling it over, I grabbed a frozen hash brown and an avocado for a staple in my eating, avocado toast.
As I was spreading the mayo and stone ground mustard combo onto my freshly airfried hashbrown, the list of to-do’s were marching one by one through my awareness and I could feel my anxiety of not getting everything completed, rising.
“No.” I heard my inner nudge say. “Take lunch for you.”
Me following its heeding, I decided to clear my mind for lunch and actually sit down instead of walking around accomplishing tasks, taking bites of my food as I passed through the kitchen.
I grabbed my freshly made Avocado Hashbrown and warm Lavender Earl Grey Tea, then plopped down onto our couch.
“Ahhhhhh” I could feel my whole self collectively express. A sigh of relief washed over me, rest was here. As I began to take a sip of my warm, enticingly good smelling tea…
“Hey Mom!” Eli yelled from his bunk. “Can you make me lunch now? I wasn’t hungry when you asked.”
Ordinarily, I would put my food down and get whatever someone needed. Today though, it was MY lunch day and I was going to set a boundary by taking it when I needed it— Actually practicing what I preach.
“Hey Buddy, right now I’m eating my food, and I can absolutely make yours when I am finished with mine. It’ll be about 10-15 minutes.” I said encouragingly. Eli likes to have a time frame of when things are going to happen and I like to respect that boundary of his in my answers.
As I turned my awareness back to myself, I felt my entire body relax as Eli said “okay mom thank you.”
I set a calm boundary and stuck to it, which felt really good.
Inhaling and exhaling I turned my attention to my lunch, waiting to be devoured. Just then, the to-do list comes in, urging me to speed up because Eli is hungry and needs food, plus I have to do the dishes and take chicken out for dinner.
“I do not agree.” I felt myself instinctively say to the anxiety. The anxiety dissipated and my awareness turned back to my lunch.
As I took each bite, I said to myself “this food nourishes my body” and “with this food, my body uses it to heal itself.” By saying these affirmations as I ate, I was setting positive intention into my food, being absorbed by my body. I am
A big believer in mindset and intentions. If you have pure loving intentions, the outcome is always pure. If you have nasty negative intentions, the outcome is negative. The output reflects the Input.
Basically, you get what you give.
In this moment, I was spending 15 minutes to slowly eat and give myself some love that my body was asking for. By using my own awareness and inner knowing, I was able to not take on guilt from taking some much-needed time for myself.
The most beautiful thing of it all, is that when those fifteen minutes came to a close, I felt absolutely rejuvenated, ready to flow through the remainder of my day. I wasn’t burnout by the time I laid my head down on the pillow, because I intentionally carved time out of my day to care for myself. When I care for me, I have more care to be able to give to those I love around me.
It’s important to note, this growth of being able to do this so well in the moment, didn’t happen over night. It came from repetition. Most importantly, it came from disconnecting with my phone and reconnecting with myself in nature.
On April 15th, my book is published and will be available on Amazon. In this book, I share with you, exactly what I did to manage my emotions in any moment that I’m in, even the big heavy ones.
Aside from the cost of the book, everything in there I suggest is free.
Healing is a lifelong journey, with new experiences happening every moment. Some of those experiences will be traumatic and will need to be healed to keep growing on our path. When we hold the big emotions of resentment, anger, fear, despair, dread, sadness, grief, guilt, shame, and so many others, we cause dis-ease in our bodies.
When we live in a negative mindset, we live a negative life. With duality, the same is true for a positive mindset. The beauty in it all is that you get to choose which one you’ll spend your precious time in.
Speaking of precious time, I am so incredibly grateful you spent some of yours with me today. I’m thankful we’re in each other’s lives.
🫶jenn
P.S. I love you.
P.P.S. What’s something you love to spend a little bit of your alone time doing? Recently, I picked up some acrylic paints and canvasses at the store, enjoying some painting.
Life doesn’t seem so fast when you slow it down. Thank you for spending a little bit of your precious time in my inner world with me today. I hope your day is as beautiful as you are friend.