Micro-Interruptions...

Do you want change?

Best way to achieve change is to get comfortable and familiar with micro-interruptions.  They are the vehicles of change.  Most of the time, we resist them.  We think we are being distracted, not present, swayed.  But allowing for, in fact, encouraging these micro-interruptions to the ongoing daily dialogue you have with yourself is how change comes into your life.  

I mean, sometimes, there are sweeping changes that come in hard and fast.  But most of the time, the change we want, the change we need happens in tiny, almost imperceptible micro adjustments to the way we are living, what we are thinking and how we are spending our time.

It is catching yourself mid-pattern and being able to make the adjustment from what you always do, to something, anything different, than what you usually do.

This is where change happens.  Another gift of micro-interruptions is that you glean insight into the why behind the behavior.  Not all the time, but there is a moment, that happens for me where I stop myself mid-pattern and I see the opportunity to choose differently and why I don’t usually choose differently and why I might want to on this particular occasion...

Meditation helps greatly with this.  I can’t explain it but when I meditate, it is like my whole being slows down and I am more aware of myself, not just while I am there meditating on the cushion, but all the time.  Sure, I still am distracted and distractible, I don’t think it is possible to be anything else in this world, but when I put the cushion time in, I get access to parts of myself that just aren’t available to me when I am not meditating.

It is kind of like vacation Erin feels differently, writes differently, gains access to parts of her that home Erin just can’t obtain, access or utilize.  I don’t know why the open road unlocks inroads into me, I just know it does.

I have come to believe these micro-interruptions are my largest and best opportunity for change.  And there are lots of things I can do to grant them more access to my life and there are lots of things I can do to shut them down completely.  The largest way to access, for me anyway, micro-interruptions is to meditate.  Next best thing?  Slow down.  Slow everything down, my pace, my heart rate, my tone, my speech.  If I am getting speedy, I am lost to myself and pretty much everyone else.

Micro-interruptions are the way I see what I am doing while I am doing it and give me a momentary pause where I can make another choice, something other than what I always do.  I may not want to do it differently, and I may not even do it differently that particular time, but the micro-interruption has already done its job.  It has opened up an option for me that didn’t exist just prior to the experience...and with that option, great, sweeping change can and does happen in my life.  Without noticing, I can change nothing.

Sometimes my days feel like one constant and unremitting interruption to my agenda, wishes and plans.  But I have learned to use these days and even just moments like them as vehicles to deliver me to a place I have never been before.  Doing things I could not do just previously, or ever in my life.  For me, change comes in these tiny micro-interruptions that are then followed by micro changes to the way I show up or live or breathe or whatever.  Anything that interrupts what is already in progress is helpful to granting me access to parts of myself, you, or change that I did not have before...

Again, still...