Finding Oasis Moments in Everyday Living

Finding Oasis Moments

Oasis moments hide in the slow-down.

I don’t know about you, but our family entered a slow-down before the upcoming craze of the holiday season. Even the slower weeks won’t be completely without craze just a little less running to practices, meets and matches. It gives the adults in our house a little bit of time to breathe and the young people a little bit of time to enjoy the benefits of home. We all like home. We all like the sports. It’s just a pause between seasons. Winter sports are right around the corner.

Does your life work its way out in seasons? I don’t mean the four seasons in nature. Does your life (with your family and/or your job, with your interests and priorities, with your energy levels and the things required of you) have seasons?

This year, more than others years, I am noticing the changes … drawing my attention to them. I don’t want to miss them.

Over the course of the last several years, our family has become busy. Almost too busy. We try to give everyone a little of what they want, but because we all live together, each addition to a schedule affects all of us. One practice changes all of our evenings or expectations for our evenings. It’s become necessary to guard some of our time together. In addition, it’s become necessary to guard some of our individual time.

Do you ever lose yourself to your busyness and wake up one day realizing that a whole season … spring, summer, fall, or winter … has passed? And you lived it, but you didn’t experience it? When this happens to me, I feel like moments of this short thing called life are slipping away with my busyness.

I don’t want to miss those moments.

In fact, I need them. They produce joy and creativity for me.

So I’m teaching myself how to see and be present again. To take moments to stop and notice life, to experience life. Real life. The weather. The sound of my kids playing together and laughing. The feel of crispy leaves crunching under my feet. The smell of fall outside, and the taste of fall flavors inside. The time to ask myself what I’m thinking or feeling. The opportunity to listen to a friend. The calmness of my mind when I paint or work on lettering.

I don’t want to miss those moments. I want to claim them. They are my oasis moments.

What about you? What pieces of your life do you want to claim?

If you want to rescue some pieces of your life from your busyness but you aren’t sure where to start, here is a suggestion for claiming a few minutes … 

with your morning coffee, on your lunch break, before you drive home, before you go to bed at night or in that tiny powder room where you catch your breath during your large family gathering.

See: Stop everything you are doing. Pause your task. Turn your mind away from your list. Look at the world around you or close your eyes and visualize it. What is happening now?

• Are there people? What are they doing? Do they look happy, sad, distracted? Do they see you?
• How is the world changing around you, at the simplest level? Are there trees, flowers, animals? What do they look like? 
• Is the sun out? What does it feel like? 
• How does the air smell? Take a few deep breaths.
• Linger in the moment as long as you can, even if it’s only a few minutes.

ThINk: How did the pause make you feel? If you can, jot this down (writing or drawing always helps me remember things).

Do: Try it again another day or time. Pay attention to how it changes your general outlook. 

I hope you captured an oasis moment today. I’d love to hear about it if you did!

Remember … write it, draw it, dance it, dream it.