For the last nine months, I have been an 8^th grade special education teacher.  My experience has been another excursion into immense self-growth.

Exhaustion was my primary characteristic during this time.  I was falling asleep while standing exhausted, not thinking clearly exhausted, forgetting things exhausted, and coming home and immediately lying down and going to sleep exhausted.  When I work, I tend to put my all into it.   I don’t have boundaries because I like to do good work.  It’s like cleaning house or doing yardwork.  Once I start, I see so much that needs to and can be accomplished.  When administrators see that a worker bee is competent and reliable, more work is given.  At the end of each 9+ hour day, for which I was not compensated over 6.5 hours, I had no energy or inclination to handle the affairs of my personal life.

I got caught up in the external.  I didn’t have time to exercise, do yoga, meditate, or otherwise work on my inner and physical selves.  Every single thought and action was focused on situations and circumstances beyond my personal being.  I got carried away – again – and became upset when I felt unappreciated, unsupported, and disrespected.  I began to feel resentful and trapped.  My perceptions reflected this state of mind.  I saw other staff members treated unfairly.  Maybe their fates would be mine.

I began to live in fear, which caused me to relinquish my physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual stability to a misguided belief that someone external to me controlled my life.

Maybe people like me who allow work to run over our lives are actually running from our lives.  Maybe work is an excuse, an escape.  I don’t want to accept this, because – truly – it’s not how I want to live.  But why do I continue to repeat this pattern?  How is it that others maintain a healthy balance between work and personal life?  They don’t become hooked on the what ifs.  What if I don’t meet my deadlines?  What if I take a day off?  For some reason, balanced people choose self and somehow manage to remain employed.  Could it be that others pick up on their sense of self-worth and reflect it back to them?

Time off from work allowed me to refocus and recommit to growing my inner self.  Finally, I was able to rest, clear my mind, reflect, and rebalance.  I began reading Joel Goldsmith again and resumed regular meditation.  I was able to become aware of how – again – I allowed myself to become caught up in the external. It is so very important to make time for self, no matter how important work, children, parents, performing good deeds, and anything else may seem.  Can you breathe?  Is your oxygen mask on?

Ultimately, all of my self-care, reading, hearing, listening, relaxing, and being silent reminded me that no thing and no person can take away my joy.  I am joy.  I create my existence from within myself.  The exhaustion, stress, and worry made me aware that I relinquished my power and my state of mind.  It’s not about the other.  I have to stay focused on what I want and know that no one can keep from me that which is for me.  Thus, there is no need to be fearful or angry about anything.

Not long after I came to this realization, I went to Walmart.  It was crowded and I drove around trying to find parking.  Finally, I saw an available space in another row.  I hurried to get there.  When I turned into the row, there were a couple of cars blocking my way. The space was still there, but I couldn’t get to it because these cars were sitting there doing nothing.  No cars were coming the other way.  I started to get agitated.  Could you let me pass?

Then I remembered that I had just come to a realization about relinquishing my power and not having control of my life.  Yet here I was – again – in the external: these cars are keeping me from getting to the parking space that I want.  This awareness made me instantly calm down, take a deep breath, and wait for the cars to move.  I thought: “the perfect spot is awaiting me.  It is mine.  I don’t have to rush to get to it.  I just have to know that it is there for me.”  I sat there and patiently waited for the cars to move.  I didn’t stress or worry.  I had assurance that the best parking space was available for me.

When the cars finally moved, there were two good spaces right up front.  This was the perfect example of my ability to create my world.  I can dream my world.  That’s what my ancestors did.  They dreamed a world and here we are.  Here I am.  So I must continuously translate the incidences of daily life into Reality until my practice becomes habit, a constant awareness of Truth.