Oh, God. My first reaction to moving from America to Germany was sitting at the bottom of the shower stall in full panic because I had no identity other than that which I had created with my job. I was terrified slow learner. It took a long time before I opened myself up and embraced being human.
Kirsten, everything you write here - it's so real and true and so beautifully worded. The analogy with soil. The dolce far niente - I go to my very tiny house in Northern Italy and the first thing that happens is someone asks me over for a coffee or gives me a tomato. Your writing moves me so because it reflects everything I have experienced in 30 years but didn't have the courage to say for a long time for fear of offending those I love, still working hard and diligently for the American Dream.
I come back to your posts again and again, and am very grateful for them. Alla prossima.
Our little house is in Piemonte in the Langhe, where Barolo and Barbaresco wines (among others ) are produced. Friuli is also a spectacular wine region! Yes, Northern Italy is so incredible. We'll head down in a few weeks and enjoy the simple pleasures of cooking on the wood stove and visiting wineries and friends - and I will be writing away there. Thank you for your wonderful publication. It makes me feel seen.
The two of you chatting about Italy is everything to this girl who is working hard to spend more months there. I'm planning to explore the northern parts of Italy later this year.
I discovered each of your Substacks on the same day, and I appreciate both of you.
Kismet!! do you know yet where you’re going to go in northern Italy? My husband has been going to Friuli for 30 years and so since we’ve been together the last eight years I’ve been there probably eight or nine times. We usually stay near the Slovenia border near a town called Cormons (we love Slovenia too) and then we love Trieste also. Friuli makes the best white wine in the world imo.
Well, you're truly speaking my husband's and my language—language of wine. We loved driving around Tuscany and Umbria this past fall. Mainly we sipped our way through different wine towns, including Montalcino and Montepulciano. And now our interests are shifting north to taste the best white wines of Italy. Friuli is at the top of the list.
We're in the learning stage of our Italian adventure, and we might spend forever in this stage, but I'd love to stumble into a village or town that just speaks to us so clearly that we want to establish some roots there. We'll see where it takes us.
I do think rest is tied to identity. I had a midlife crisis when I quit my law career for the church. In my case, there wasn't nearly as much to do in my second career as in my first. All I knew about myself when the crisis began was that I was a busy lawyer. It took three years of therapy, reading, and loving care from myself and others to discover a deeper me. In the middle of it, my wife observed that "God seems to be paying you just to be alive." It was a difficult lesson. I'm well into a third career, another busy one. I wonder how consistent I am being to my true self.
Thank you for sharing about your journey. think it’s really hard to give up the busyness addiction. And I really do think it is an addiction because it gives us the same kind of numbing that we would get from alcohol or drugs. I really try to pay attention to when I’m using work as a way to numb out. That said, I don’t think there’s anything wrong with loving our work and I actually work a lot it’s just a question of are we creating enough room also to have rest. And I would include in rest, spending time with friends and family in a leisurely way where we are totally present. The fact that you asked the question whether you’re being true to your authentic self suggests that may be you feel like you aren’t. If that’s the case, I would dig into that a little bit there might be a way to bring things more into balance.
Thank you, Kristen. Good thoughts. Balance, family, friends, and presence with them are key for me. This term, I put myself in a new situation. After 19 years of teaching English and composition in one system, I moved to the city to teach with a different system and (in one case) a new prep. I'm looking for adventure, and as long as I have that mindset, things go relatively well. But an old tape came with me, a workaholic one that wants to find my identity in job performance. Because it's in a new situation, the challenge this year is more clear cut (and more clearly internal) than it has appeared to be in the past.
I hear what you’re saying but people in their 20s 30s and 40s in many other countries are also building their careers but they still take time to rest and have long vacations. The reason they do this is that they live in a culture that values this and supports this. my ultimate point of my essay is that we need to reject the idea that rust is a luxury or some thing that we earn -- and stop accepting productivity culture as normal.
Okay so here I am, turning 67 next month, having applied for Social Security last week (my full benefits age was 66 and a half but when I reached that exact age my mother died of advanced Alzheimer’s and a fall and I was a little distracted; still am actually, but I know she was ready to be out of that life), and having taken up knitting yesterday. Doesn’t knitting sound kind of restful? Except I’m learning, and it’s making me feel a little tense, but the idea of collecting social security, and still teaching qigong in the mornings, and knitting, feels like I’m getting on a more restful track. No question that it’s a thousand percent more restful than being the main caregiver for my poor demented mom was.
Now, if I lived alone and had to earn enough money to handle all expenses, I’d have to work way more.
But I am where I am, and it feels sensible. I’ve always had what I’ve thought of as a lazy streak. When I was a teenager, my parents wanted me to work in the summer, like at a store, but I wanted to read and go to the pool. I never said that to them, but I didn’t want to work tons of hours a week. Instead, I was willing to babysit, which is hard work, but it was random and I could always say no.
I’ve never been a career dynamo, and I think it’s because when I started my working life, I always wanted to leave at 5:00, and if I had to stay late to meet deadlines, I was miserable. I was not ambitious, and I was a little embarrassed about that.
Also--artists and writers might not have pen or paintbrush to paper 40+ hours a week, but they are definitely thinking of their work constantly, I’m sure. It’s invisible productivity.
It’s easy to say that it’s time to rest. I completely agree with it, but people in their 20s, 30s, 40s...they’re building their careers and it’s probably so hard for them to set boundaries that give them time to stare into space if they want to.
But let’s hope that writing about this topic as you do is amplifying it in waves. The stone tossed into the lake and rippling out to the wide world.
Pamela, I recently retired as well. I take your point about the stages of life referencing career; however, a work culture retooling is needed.
There is a fundamental imbalance in the work/life dynamic. We’ve allowed the boundary between the two to become permeable.
Amongst many other grievences I can think of, the most egregious are the issues that impact our most human rights. Somehow we have allowed the work culture to influence child bearing, when and where we can nurse, and child care in general. Then we are made to feel guilty for putting our employer second to our so called private lives.
Europe is ahead of America in maintaining a philosophical separation between work and everything else. We need to make fundamental changes now. We need to do this so our 20 and 30 year olds wont miss their lives or suffer nervous breakdowns along the way.
Sitting here looking at the Adriatic Sea from our Puglian rental villa. Dreading returning to the USA b/c of all mentioned in the article. I want peace instead of productivity.
Yes, I actually quoted that doctor in my piece about why we are moving to Italy! I think you are right that if you are going to find burnout in Italy, it will be in Milan but an Italian who told me about her burn out while living in Milan said it’s still nothing like what happens in the US. She would not put it in the same category. I’m so glad that you have had time to rest and heal.
Kirsten, I'm grateful for your calls for sanity in an increasingly insane world. My husband and I moved from California to Milan, Italy, just over a year ago. Milan is considered the business capital of Italy; I get the feeling that the rest of Italy thinks of Milan as just money money money, business business business. And certainly, people here work hard. AND YET...the pace here feels so much more sane than anything I saw in San Francisco. Maybe they don't take two-hour lunches, but they certainly go for an aperitivo on the regular. And they definitely have long, leisurely dinners. And they go to the sea or the mountains for 2-4 weeks in August. And they take 1-2 weeks off over Christmas and New Year's. There was an article in WaPo recently that quoted a Milanese doctor who said he would never move to the U.S. because "people there only get like four weeks of vacation a year." He seemed to not realize that many, many Americans are lucky to have TWO weeks a year. I was in my late 40s before I had four weeks of vacation (and then it was combined with sick time and renamed "PTO," which meant if I got sick enough to miss work, I would have less time available for an actual vacation!). By then, my personal and professional lives and habits were so unhealthy that four weeks wasn't nearly enough and the cracks started to show. I don't think I really started to recover and find my footing again until I'd been in Italy for over a year. I'm so excited about the year ahead and my renewed embrace of saying yes to my body and mind, and no to so much else.
Kirsten, you’re quickly turning rest into my favorite rant.
There was a time when America was chiefly agrarian. Much, if not most, of the population understood the inescapable truth: land lies fallow or it breaks down. No one would suggest the land could function with a microbreak! Why should we be persuaded to believe a human—an infinitely more complex organism than soil—can recover with less time than is needed?
I think you have it precisly correct: to rest is to rest, not rest to produce.
I am perhaps too dramatic in asserting the Industrial Revolution was the greatest social calamity to befall America. But what more salient conclusion should I draw from a period of unregulated hours, child labor, and, oh, yeah, the ability to work all hours of the day for greater…productivity.
We’ve come a long way from those heady days of runaway profits, child labor abuse, grueling hours, and casual disregard for workplace injury. But with the exception of child labor laws, have we really made a substantial work/life improvement?
But like you said, Kirsten, what is more likely is we have preserved those heady profits and made the culture of over-work noble and virtuous. They have sold us a bill of goods and we bought it.
To rest is to rest; not to silo greater energy reserves to produce more for work.
I used to embrace a similar work harder mentality. As a member of the city fire dept and Army Reserve, I often scheduled one duty after the other, with the firehouse being a 24-hr shift. I remember reading about Gen. Stanley McChrystal and how he famously only took time to eat one meal a day, and his staff referred to being “on the pain train.” For whatever reason, I admired that and worked to emulate it.
Through equal parts gained wisdom and burnout, I now see it’s not a healthy or sustainable way to live. I now take that after-work nap to recharge and try to keep a good amount of white space on the calendar. I find it has made a difference.
I am not a person of faith. Yet long ago I decided that I would support and uphold those who are. I believe in what is right for you though it not be for me.
The trouble is, that Protestant work ethic--which has its roots in the notion of predestination--is a motive force throughout our society, not just faith. We’re all on that train bound for hard work, frugality, and discipline.
You really need to stop pushing my buttons, Kirsten 😁🤣
Wayne, I’m right there with you. I spent 40 yrs in military and government service. It’s an institution of unremitting work where advantage is taken of those willing to surrender themselves to it’s demands. It can be a rewarding finish, but is brutal in the making of that reward.
I work with people who log onto their work computers, either in the office or from home, 7 days a week nearly year round. And I've had someone tell me that when they don't check their email on the weekend (often both Saturday and Sunday), they feel guilty and like they're falling behind.
I often wonder if they're telling me this because they want me to feel guilty for NOT having this practice, or if they're screaming for help because they know I found a way to say no to the "American productivity fetish". I'm pretty sure it could go either way at this point.
I think they are brainwashed honestly. I know I was for much of my life. I just bought into the idea that what made me a good person was working all the time.
Very well said Kirsten and as usual, I couldn't agree more. As a spiritual director, the very first thing I ask my directees is, "How much time do you spend in contemplation or meditation?" Not surprisingly, the overwhelming answer is zero or next to zero. Is it any wonder that our hyper-time conscious society is driven to and rewarded for thought process efficiency? Pervasive dualistic thinking goes hand in hand with our love for time efficiency. To contemplate, to look at the different angles to an argument just takes too much time.
As an ultramarathoner, in order to be successful and increase your chances of actually finishing, it is a training imperative to actually taper, to decrease your mileage and in some cases to actually stop running days, weeks ahead of an event. To be honest, the tapering mode can be the most nerve wracking time before a race because you are not actively training, but actually reducing your work. Only from years of successfully negotiating an ultra event do I even begin trusting the process of rest.
Lying fallow definitely is a good thing. Thanks again for your wonderful essay.
My comment is "late" because I "procrastinated" about writing a response. Or, was it that I preferred to contemplate this posting for a bit before responding?
I am certainly violating social meeting etiquette, am I not? I mean, this posting was SOOO last week!
Appropriately, I read the post while enjoying a good cup of coffee, while gazing at the Pacific Ocean, after a good sleep-in. My spouse and I were enjoying our annual tradition of spending the first week of January at the coast. It's easier to do now that we are retired, but the tradition began when we were both in our early fifties, dealing with stressful jobs and insufficient savings after midlife divorce and remarriage. We use the time to rest and review finances and other big-picture life issues. Definitely a sabbath practice for us.
We can learn so much from nature. Love the reference to the Olive trees. I’ve entered my retirement years but “US over busyness” remains a challenge, especially for Enneagram type 3’s like me. For me, living in the US is rather like an alcoholic moving above a saloon (Ian Cron). Walking in the woods with Hank and reflecting on nature and meditating on the Lord, his love and priorities, help me to stay centered. But it’s a constant struggle. Thank you for sharing your wisdom.
yes, indeed, thank you, Kirsten! It's what the monastics understand as thin places or threshold places. The dark time of the year where nature appears to be sleeping while preparing for a new Spring :-)
"American productivity fetish".
Oh, God. My first reaction to moving from America to Germany was sitting at the bottom of the shower stall in full panic because I had no identity other than that which I had created with my job. I was terrified slow learner. It took a long time before I opened myself up and embraced being human.
Kirsten, everything you write here - it's so real and true and so beautifully worded. The analogy with soil. The dolce far niente - I go to my very tiny house in Northern Italy and the first thing that happens is someone asks me over for a coffee or gives me a tomato. Your writing moves me so because it reflects everything I have experienced in 30 years but didn't have the courage to say for a long time for fear of offending those I love, still working hard and diligently for the American Dream.
I come back to your posts again and again, and am very grateful for them. Alla prossima.
Thank you so much!! Where in northern Italy my is your house? We spend a lot of time in Friuli and live northern Italy so much.
Our little house is in Piemonte in the Langhe, where Barolo and Barbaresco wines (among others ) are produced. Friuli is also a spectacular wine region! Yes, Northern Italy is so incredible. We'll head down in a few weeks and enjoy the simple pleasures of cooking on the wood stove and visiting wineries and friends - and I will be writing away there. Thank you for your wonderful publication. It makes me feel seen.
The two of you chatting about Italy is everything to this girl who is working hard to spend more months there. I'm planning to explore the northern parts of Italy later this year.
I discovered each of your Substacks on the same day, and I appreciate both of you.
Kismet!! do you know yet where you’re going to go in northern Italy? My husband has been going to Friuli for 30 years and so since we’ve been together the last eight years I’ve been there probably eight or nine times. We usually stay near the Slovenia border near a town called Cormons (we love Slovenia too) and then we love Trieste also. Friuli makes the best white wine in the world imo.
Well, you're truly speaking my husband's and my language—language of wine. We loved driving around Tuscany and Umbria this past fall. Mainly we sipped our way through different wine towns, including Montalcino and Montepulciano. And now our interests are shifting north to taste the best white wines of Italy. Friuli is at the top of the list.
We're in the learning stage of our Italian adventure, and we might spend forever in this stage, but I'd love to stumble into a village or town that just speaks to us so clearly that we want to establish some roots there. We'll see where it takes us.
Keep me posted pls!!
sounds heavenly!! and thank you for your kind words :-)
I do think rest is tied to identity. I had a midlife crisis when I quit my law career for the church. In my case, there wasn't nearly as much to do in my second career as in my first. All I knew about myself when the crisis began was that I was a busy lawyer. It took three years of therapy, reading, and loving care from myself and others to discover a deeper me. In the middle of it, my wife observed that "God seems to be paying you just to be alive." It was a difficult lesson. I'm well into a third career, another busy one. I wonder how consistent I am being to my true self.
Thank you for sharing about your journey. think it’s really hard to give up the busyness addiction. And I really do think it is an addiction because it gives us the same kind of numbing that we would get from alcohol or drugs. I really try to pay attention to when I’m using work as a way to numb out. That said, I don’t think there’s anything wrong with loving our work and I actually work a lot it’s just a question of are we creating enough room also to have rest. And I would include in rest, spending time with friends and family in a leisurely way where we are totally present. The fact that you asked the question whether you’re being true to your authentic self suggests that may be you feel like you aren’t. If that’s the case, I would dig into that a little bit there might be a way to bring things more into balance.
Thank you, Kristen. Good thoughts. Balance, family, friends, and presence with them are key for me. This term, I put myself in a new situation. After 19 years of teaching English and composition in one system, I moved to the city to teach with a different system and (in one case) a new prep. I'm looking for adventure, and as long as I have that mindset, things go relatively well. But an old tape came with me, a workaholic one that wants to find my identity in job performance. Because it's in a new situation, the challenge this year is more clear cut (and more clearly internal) than it has appeared to be in the past.
I hear what you’re saying but people in their 20s 30s and 40s in many other countries are also building their careers but they still take time to rest and have long vacations. The reason they do this is that they live in a culture that values this and supports this. my ultimate point of my essay is that we need to reject the idea that rust is a luxury or some thing that we earn -- and stop accepting productivity culture as normal.
Okay so here I am, turning 67 next month, having applied for Social Security last week (my full benefits age was 66 and a half but when I reached that exact age my mother died of advanced Alzheimer’s and a fall and I was a little distracted; still am actually, but I know she was ready to be out of that life), and having taken up knitting yesterday. Doesn’t knitting sound kind of restful? Except I’m learning, and it’s making me feel a little tense, but the idea of collecting social security, and still teaching qigong in the mornings, and knitting, feels like I’m getting on a more restful track. No question that it’s a thousand percent more restful than being the main caregiver for my poor demented mom was.
Now, if I lived alone and had to earn enough money to handle all expenses, I’d have to work way more.
But I am where I am, and it feels sensible. I’ve always had what I’ve thought of as a lazy streak. When I was a teenager, my parents wanted me to work in the summer, like at a store, but I wanted to read and go to the pool. I never said that to them, but I didn’t want to work tons of hours a week. Instead, I was willing to babysit, which is hard work, but it was random and I could always say no.
I’ve never been a career dynamo, and I think it’s because when I started my working life, I always wanted to leave at 5:00, and if I had to stay late to meet deadlines, I was miserable. I was not ambitious, and I was a little embarrassed about that.
Also--artists and writers might not have pen or paintbrush to paper 40+ hours a week, but they are definitely thinking of their work constantly, I’m sure. It’s invisible productivity.
It’s easy to say that it’s time to rest. I completely agree with it, but people in their 20s, 30s, 40s...they’re building their careers and it’s probably so hard for them to set boundaries that give them time to stare into space if they want to.
But let’s hope that writing about this topic as you do is amplifying it in waves. The stone tossed into the lake and rippling out to the wide world.
Pamela, I recently retired as well. I take your point about the stages of life referencing career; however, a work culture retooling is needed.
There is a fundamental imbalance in the work/life dynamic. We’ve allowed the boundary between the two to become permeable.
Amongst many other grievences I can think of, the most egregious are the issues that impact our most human rights. Somehow we have allowed the work culture to influence child bearing, when and where we can nurse, and child care in general. Then we are made to feel guilty for putting our employer second to our so called private lives.
Europe is ahead of America in maintaining a philosophical separation between work and everything else. We need to make fundamental changes now. We need to do this so our 20 and 30 year olds wont miss their lives or suffer nervous breakdowns along the way.
Sitting here looking at the Adriatic Sea from our Puglian rental villa. Dreading returning to the USA b/c of all mentioned in the article. I want peace instead of productivity.
Oh that is going to be hard to leave!
“Sabbath” - seems the ancients were on to something after all - thanks for your article + best wishes in the new year(s) ♥️
Yes, I actually quoted that doctor in my piece about why we are moving to Italy! I think you are right that if you are going to find burnout in Italy, it will be in Milan but an Italian who told me about her burn out while living in Milan said it’s still nothing like what happens in the US. She would not put it in the same category. I’m so glad that you have had time to rest and heal.
Kirsten, I'm grateful for your calls for sanity in an increasingly insane world. My husband and I moved from California to Milan, Italy, just over a year ago. Milan is considered the business capital of Italy; I get the feeling that the rest of Italy thinks of Milan as just money money money, business business business. And certainly, people here work hard. AND YET...the pace here feels so much more sane than anything I saw in San Francisco. Maybe they don't take two-hour lunches, but they certainly go for an aperitivo on the regular. And they definitely have long, leisurely dinners. And they go to the sea or the mountains for 2-4 weeks in August. And they take 1-2 weeks off over Christmas and New Year's. There was an article in WaPo recently that quoted a Milanese doctor who said he would never move to the U.S. because "people there only get like four weeks of vacation a year." He seemed to not realize that many, many Americans are lucky to have TWO weeks a year. I was in my late 40s before I had four weeks of vacation (and then it was combined with sick time and renamed "PTO," which meant if I got sick enough to miss work, I would have less time available for an actual vacation!). By then, my personal and professional lives and habits were so unhealthy that four weeks wasn't nearly enough and the cracks started to show. I don't think I really started to recover and find my footing again until I'd been in Italy for over a year. I'm so excited about the year ahead and my renewed embrace of saying yes to my body and mind, and no to so much else.
Kirsten, you’re quickly turning rest into my favorite rant.
There was a time when America was chiefly agrarian. Much, if not most, of the population understood the inescapable truth: land lies fallow or it breaks down. No one would suggest the land could function with a microbreak! Why should we be persuaded to believe a human—an infinitely more complex organism than soil—can recover with less time than is needed?
I think you have it precisly correct: to rest is to rest, not rest to produce.
I am perhaps too dramatic in asserting the Industrial Revolution was the greatest social calamity to befall America. But what more salient conclusion should I draw from a period of unregulated hours, child labor, and, oh, yeah, the ability to work all hours of the day for greater…productivity.
We’ve come a long way from those heady days of runaway profits, child labor abuse, grueling hours, and casual disregard for workplace injury. But with the exception of child labor laws, have we really made a substantial work/life improvement?
But like you said, Kirsten, what is more likely is we have preserved those heady profits and made the culture of over-work noble and virtuous. They have sold us a bill of goods and we bought it.
To rest is to rest; not to silo greater energy reserves to produce more for work.
Thanks for this Kirsten!
I’m so here for this rant!! 🔥
I used to embrace a similar work harder mentality. As a member of the city fire dept and Army Reserve, I often scheduled one duty after the other, with the firehouse being a 24-hr shift. I remember reading about Gen. Stanley McChrystal and how he famously only took time to eat one meal a day, and his staff referred to being “on the pain train.” For whatever reason, I admired that and worked to emulate it.
Through equal parts gained wisdom and burnout, I now see it’s not a healthy or sustainable way to live. I now take that after-work nap to recharge and try to keep a good amount of white space on the calendar. I find it has made a difference.
I used to admire this kind of stuff too. We really have been indoctrinated-- it’s the Protestant Ethic on steroids.
I am not a person of faith. Yet long ago I decided that I would support and uphold those who are. I believe in what is right for you though it not be for me.
The trouble is, that Protestant work ethic--which has its roots in the notion of predestination--is a motive force throughout our society, not just faith. We’re all on that train bound for hard work, frugality, and discipline.
You really need to stop pushing my buttons, Kirsten 😁🤣
I hope you didn’t think I was endorsing the protestant work ethic!!
No, not at all. Your comments are salient. I can’t keep my mouth shut 🤐 😁
Wayne, I’m right there with you. I spent 40 yrs in military and government service. It’s an institution of unremitting work where advantage is taken of those willing to surrender themselves to it’s demands. It can be a rewarding finish, but is brutal in the making of that reward.
While I wouldn’t have traded it for a private sector career, you’re so right.
I work with people who log onto their work computers, either in the office or from home, 7 days a week nearly year round. And I've had someone tell me that when they don't check their email on the weekend (often both Saturday and Sunday), they feel guilty and like they're falling behind.
I often wonder if they're telling me this because they want me to feel guilty for NOT having this practice, or if they're screaming for help because they know I found a way to say no to the "American productivity fetish". I'm pretty sure it could go either way at this point.
I think they are brainwashed honestly. I know I was for much of my life. I just bought into the idea that what made me a good person was working all the time.
Very well said Kirsten and as usual, I couldn't agree more. As a spiritual director, the very first thing I ask my directees is, "How much time do you spend in contemplation or meditation?" Not surprisingly, the overwhelming answer is zero or next to zero. Is it any wonder that our hyper-time conscious society is driven to and rewarded for thought process efficiency? Pervasive dualistic thinking goes hand in hand with our love for time efficiency. To contemplate, to look at the different angles to an argument just takes too much time.
As an ultramarathoner, in order to be successful and increase your chances of actually finishing, it is a training imperative to actually taper, to decrease your mileage and in some cases to actually stop running days, weeks ahead of an event. To be honest, the tapering mode can be the most nerve wracking time before a race because you are not actively training, but actually reducing your work. Only from years of successfully negotiating an ultra event do I even begin trusting the process of rest.
Lying fallow definitely is a good thing. Thanks again for your wonderful essay.
My comment is "late" because I "procrastinated" about writing a response. Or, was it that I preferred to contemplate this posting for a bit before responding?
I am certainly violating social meeting etiquette, am I not? I mean, this posting was SOOO last week!
Appropriately, I read the post while enjoying a good cup of coffee, while gazing at the Pacific Ocean, after a good sleep-in. My spouse and I were enjoying our annual tradition of spending the first week of January at the coast. It's easier to do now that we are retired, but the tradition began when we were both in our early fifties, dealing with stressful jobs and insufficient savings after midlife divorce and remarriage. We use the time to rest and review finances and other big-picture life issues. Definitely a sabbath practice for us.
you were contemplating!! :-)
We can learn so much from nature. Love the reference to the Olive trees. I’ve entered my retirement years but “US over busyness” remains a challenge, especially for Enneagram type 3’s like me. For me, living in the US is rather like an alcoholic moving above a saloon (Ian Cron). Walking in the woods with Hank and reflecting on nature and meditating on the Lord, his love and priorities, help me to stay centered. But it’s a constant struggle. Thank you for sharing your wisdom.
That’s such a great analogy for the Enneagram three in America!
yes, indeed, thank you, Kirsten! It's what the monastics understand as thin places or threshold places. The dark time of the year where nature appears to be sleeping while preparing for a new Spring :-)
All of this…yesssssss
Much of the talk boils down to this: https://garygruber.com/less-is-more/
As an ex-pat in Mexico, we moved away from much of the noise and confusion that seems so prevalent north of the border.