Have you ever wanted something badly? So badly, that the thought of “it” consumed you? Perhaps you felt that you were incomplete without it. Or maybe that you couldn’t do something without it. Other relatively important things in your life faded into the background. Your sole focus was “it” and the fact that “it” was not part of your life consumed time and energy.
Perhaps a feeling of regret or let-down was part of it as well. Anger might also be a response you felt. A whole multitude of emotions can wash through your mind and body when you feel as if something is missing.
Now look at where you are right now. What is missing? What is something you want badly and don’t have? What emotion is tied to that? How much energy is it consuming?
As a teenager, I wanted a rabbit fur coat very badly. Every girl in my class had one, except me. I begged, pleaded and cried to my Mom to get me a rabbit fur coat. I must have been passionate enough to stir her as we soon went shopping and obtained that deeply desired rabbit fur coat. Don’t think that tactic work often with my Mom. It did not. I cherished and was grateful for the coat and could now focus on other things.
As a more mature adult (most days), I see how emotion can cloud our day-to-day world. Pulled, pressured and time starved, we have little time for things that can have the same emotional pull as that coat did for me. As an adult, the “it” is truly more significant than the rabbit coat. The “it” is time with family, holding our child, being with our spouse, enjoying a workout, dinner with girlfriends, a guy’s weekend or even just simply reading a book.
What if we wove a little of these important things into our days and weeks. People like to talk about work-life balance. Balance implies that things are equally weighted and that puts us under undue pressure. Like many things, a taste of ice cream or a sip of something sweet, can satisfy and then the craving (the emotion) subsides, the all-consuming thought abates and we can once again be productive, happy and fulfilled.
Could weaving in those things that are deeply desired by you ease some of the emotion associated with lack? Could you possibly find more joy, and dare I say “balance” in your days?