1.4.21 // living wide awake

Living wide awake.
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For the past two years, I've told myself this mantra.
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A mantra that I needed to live like a child, to learn something new every day, and to be maxing my moments here on earth.
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I read "To Shake the Sleeping Self" back in 2018 and thought,” Jedidiah Jenkins has really figured out how to live life, this is how I want to live." And in the years since I read that book, I've told myself to keep running, to keep moving in order to max my days and to live wide awake...
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But, this topic came up recently in therapy and the conversation I had with my therapist had me walking away with a completely new understanding of my age-old mantra to "live wide awake."
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Let me explain...
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If you only sleep 4 hours a night, the next day are you awake and alive and alert? No.
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What about when you sleep 8 hours a night? Sure, I imagine so.
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I had been subscribing to the understanding that "living wide awake" is doing and seeing as much as I can. I thought it meant squeezing more in, having more adventures, learning more and faster.
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But in reality, living wide awake, with my new understanding, meant living presently. I can't live presently if I'm a tattered worn down version of myself. So taking time to slow down and just be was actually just as powerful and just as needed to "live wide awake."
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Slowing down isn't easy for me. Societally, it isn't valued either. We're told to run and to keep running in work and in our personal lives. But, damn. Not only is that not sustainable, but our mental health takes a toll.
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Don't get me wrong, every single part of me still wants to run, I thrive in that type of environment... but, as I continually discuss with my therapist, I'm going to have to *learn* how to slow down. It doesn't come naturally. I'm not a tea-drinking, meditating yogi... But, I'm learning.
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This learning and unlearning have been a really tangible way that I've seen change in myself, especially in my understanding.
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I'm not willing or wanting to give up my "living wide awake" mantra, but it's meaning is no longer a chaotic sprint, instead, you'll see me walking with calm breath and living right here and right now in the present.