Mama Needs a Refill

When we wait for our time, put ourself last, our needs, our passions and desires will get lost, forgotten.

Still in a food coma and out of town staying with family for the Thanksgiving weekend I need a moment away from everyone to figure out what I need today to fill my cup. Tucked away in the guest room out of site from the others I seek refuge. The local yoga studio is closed but a walk is a definite possibility and my sister-in-law is game to join me. Contemplating a nap and it’s only 10 in the morning, I would not be missed, so many of us here, I could get some serious shut eye before they even discovered I was missing from the crowd.

And this is what it means to take the time, make the effort, to fill your cup. Move away from others, quiet your mind, do what you need to hear your desires that stir below the surface. As I write this three different people have knocked, or just come in to the guest room, apparently the Black Friday bug has hit half of the group. Four people.  Knock, knock, make it five visits in my place of refuge.

My solitude may have to happen in the bathroom. But I don’t give up. Because it is literally a few moments that I need, just  a long inhale’s worth of time to refill.

If I gave in too early and threw in the towel I would only later erupt from frustration.

So I answer the knock calmly and say, just a few more minutes, then I’ll be ready.  I read a few words, quiet my mind, write, check my online chess games, breathe again, post this, then I am ready to go back and be part of the crowd.

You have to take your time for if you wait for it to happen, it just doesn’t. It will get swept up in the crowd, washed down with the pie and whip cream, blown over, forgotten.  And sometimes the little bit you take is just enough to get you to the next place.

Cups at a recent retreat waiting to be decorated...just like us, waiting to be refilled...eventual potential!

A few weeks ago the words of my yoga class instructor resonated loud and clear and have stuck with me. When leading us into a pose she directed the moves guiding us with her words. Then at the end of her instruction detailing how the posture should look, she would add, Eventually.

Hands here, head there, and then, Eventually, but not today your eyes will see the wall behind you. Or after making sure we were safely in the next pose, Perhaps not today but one day your forehead will be on the ground, eventually, not now.

What a lovely, gentle way to speak to ourselves. We don’t have to achieve it all now. Every step leads us to the next. It is impossible to move to the final step, the goal if you will, if you haven’t taken the steps leading up.

Eventually, one day we will get there. When we have done the work, taken the time and are ready.

A retreat attendee paints her cup with a reminder we all need...Believe.

Today was the second of the Mama Needs A Refill mini-retreat series: The Mental Cup. Six women gathered to unwind, reflect, connect, and refill.

With all the planning and preparation that goes into this, the fact that I get so much out of giving these retreats, is just icing on the cake. I may be the facilitator but we are all the teachers, reaping the benefits of everyone’s wisdom.

We shared on what drains and fills our cups. Many of us readers we found books a great way to mentally refill. All mothers we found the daily chores of house duties to often be draining and overwhelming.

With all the wisdom circling the room it was clear no matter how you choose to refill your cup or how it gets emptied, it all starts with believing in yourself. Believing we are worth it and discovering everyone is better for it when we create time for ourselves. The added icing to the cake (who wouldn’t want cake without it?) is knowing we are not alone.

Recent trip to Disneyland with my family.

Just home from a trip to Disneyland with my family where I didn’t get much me time. I didn’t get to yoga, I barely wrote, not a lot of time carved out for me. And you know what? I still came home with a full cup.

The moments gathered together in one hotel room or around a table for a meal or squished together on a ride filled me up and that isn’t always the case for me. Often I’m too wound up, tired, stressed to enjoy my family. But I was so focused on having fun as well as creating fun for my kids that I found my needs being met by letting go of being in control and just having fun. We got to connect as a family in ways we don’t always get to with time, schedule, commitments and other priorities.

I wanted this family, this is what I asked for and then with life stresses you forget that and you forget to have fun with each other. And really that is the priority, that is where the importance lies.  Oh, to live like we are at Disneyland, spinning around and around with those we love, with those who matter most, without a care in the world.

I’m a city girl who loves the beauty of nature. I have lived in some beautiful places and traveled to others. It’s still interesting to me how at times I can take the beauty around me for granted. Rushing past the view of mountains, ignoring the water and islands in sight, not bothering to stop and soak up the exquisiteness before me.

I have held many of my Mama Needs A Refill retreats in my mother’s home which has an expansive view of the Olympics, and clear views of the ferry going back and forth across the Puget Sound.  Retreat attendees don’t take the view for granted stopping in their tracks when they enter her home, taking a long breath as they drink in the beauty out the window. My mom feels honored to have her home used as a retreat space, feeling in some ways like she should offer up this space for others. She is a widow, living alone and wants to share the gifts of the scenery out her back door.

Often just fixing our eyes on a thing of beauty – a bit of nature can fill our cup enough to jolt us out of taking all that we have for granted.