Wonder Woman? Yogi? Or stressed out Woman?!
Yesterday, I went to the beach with my friend and her two children. I’ve been really stressed lately and I should have been working on a grant, but I needed to take a break! I told myself that I would only be on the beach for a couple of hours, and then I would go home and write the grant.
I’ve been stressed for a lot of reasons. Work, family, friends, relationships, nothing seems to be working right lately and everything was feeling frustrating. I’m a generally optimistic person, but my optimism was running on empty. The beach was a reset.
After a lovely and relaxing few hours, it was time to leave and re-focus on that grant… But, when my friend got back to her car, she realized the battery was dead. I began to worry about the time this would take and getting back to the ‘to-do’ list… Plus, I was annoyed with the idea of one more thing going wrong!
Her car was in a parking garage, parked facing in, so the engine was near the concrete wall. There was no way for me to move my car close enough to attach the jumper cables. My friend has two small sons, and the feminist in me wanted for her and I to be able to show them that these two women could handle this… But how?
To be honest, the plan we came up with seemed neither good nor plausible and we didn’t think it would work. But, we weren’t sure what else to do, so decided to try anyways. My friend got into her car and put it in neutral and I began to push. Her car is a big Jeep / SUV type. And although I’m not weak, I don’t do crossfit or anything like that. I do yoga and I run. But, I began to move the car.
My goal was to push the car out of its spot and into the spot behind it (about two and half car lengths away). But, every couple of feet, one of the kids would become a ‘backseat driver’ and make a sound that would make me worry we were about to run into something and we would stop the car. Double check that nothing was in the way, and start pushing again. I learned that, once you get momentum, pushing a car is not that hard. But, starting to gain that momentum is tough. Each time we stopped the car, I had to get it to go again. And much to everyone’s amazement, my own included, each time, I did! At one point, I heard the 7 year old boy ask, ‘how is she doing that?’ to which the 9 year old boy responded ‘yoga’!
Yoga is great, but I’m fairly certain my car push was fueled by stress, and absolute distain for the idea of one more thing going wrong! And honestly, once the car was started and we all left I felt like I could do anything!
Since yesterday, I’ve been thinking; 1) OMG I pushed a car!, and 2) the incredible metaphor that this experience embodies.
I began thinking about the momentum that life gains as it goes along easily sometimes, and the intense momentum it sometimes takes to start moving it in the right direction again. I even like the idea that skills I already practice, be they my therapeutic practice or yoga might just get the momentum going. Maybe I can accomplish anything!
So to quote Dr. Seuss, for everyone who is feeling a like they’ve run out of momentum…
Kid, you’ll move mountains
