Between Heaven + Earth: Fran Jacques

I think that saving a time in the morning just for yourself, before or after breakfast, is the perfect way to begin the day. After checking through my bookshelf, I found a little booklet by Alexandra Stoddard, “Finding Joy in Changing Times” in which the author talks about ways to enjoy solitude.

She describes the morning as “my time to mediate, to sit in solitude.” To find solitude in a busy life, we must train ourselves to walk away from friends, from work, from anything that interrupts the flow of this reconnection to our self. “Only in solitude,” wrote the Chinese novelist Han Suyin “can man learn to know himself, learn to handle his own eternity of aloneness. This self-love is essential to being able to participate joyfully in all the experiences of living. Life is full of sorrow, pain and loss and yet if we’re not able to recognize the great gift of the mystery or our own being here, we’ve missed it all. It’s not unloving toward others to claim space and to find a private place where you can hear the vibrations of your heart.”

My personal private space is my yard where I can watch the birds busy at the feeder or look upward to watch larger birds flying overhead. There is something to see or hear at all times of the day—from neighbors out for a walk to the breezes rustling through the trees. The key is to enjoy the moment—whether it is in front of a computer screen or in a porch chair. That is my key to spending an enjoyable day.