Filled and Unfulfilled
One of the most obvious characteristics of our daily lives is that we are busy. We experience our days as filled with things to do, people to meet, projects to finish, emails to send, calls to make and appointments to keep. In fact, we are almost always aware of being behind schedule. There is a nagging sense that there are unfinished tasks, unfulfilled promises, and unrealized proposals. There is always something else that we should have remembered, done or said. There are always people we did not speak to, write to or visit. Thus, although we are very busy, we also have a lingering feeling of never really fulfilling our obligations.
The strange thing however is that it is very hard not to be busy. Being busy has become a status symbol. People expect us to be busy and to have many things on our minds. Being busy and being important often seem to mean the same thing. In our productive–oriented society, being busy, having an occupation has become one of the main ways, if not the main way, of identifying ourselves.
More enslaving than our occupation, however, are our preoccupations. To be preoccupied means to fill our time and place long before we are there. This is worrying in the more specific sense of the word. It is a mind filled with “ifs”. What if I get the flu? What if I lose my job? What if…
All these “ifs” fill our minds with anxious thoughts and make us wonder constantly what to do and what to say in case something should happen in the future. Much, if not most, of our suffering is the result of these preoccupations. They prevent us from feeling a real inner freedom. Since we are always preparing for eventualities, we seldom fully trust the moment.
You must become aware of your filled state and your preoccupations as they interfere with your moment to moment being and your freedom.
I wish you freedom -
WayneCBurgess.com © 2022
WayneCBurgess.com Where thoughts are thunk…
