It’s the rest of the week. Does it feel like it?
Do you like roller coasters?
How about the ride in a cylinder that spins around so fast that when they drop the floor, you stay pinned to the walls, suspended with your feet dangling?
It’s called The Gravitron. I looked it up—and then I spent the next 40 minutes learning about G-force, vectors, Newton's 3 laws of motion... until my mind was spinning a bit.
(Here's a fun refresher if you're curious: https://static.nsta.org/case_s...)
There was that one person on the web who claimed that the Gravitron doesn't make you feel dizzy, but most everyone else was explaining why you feel dizzy and nauseated and what to do about it
The Cleveland Clinic website explains that "Motion sickness occurs when your brain can't make sense of information sent from your eyes, ears and body."
Does the week ever get spinning so fast that your soul gets a little motion sick trying to make sense off all the input?
And when it comes time to sit down and rest, does your inner world still have the sensation of spinning?
If you’re feeling a bit of soul vertigo, here’s a little exercise that I might be helpful:
1. Notice your breathing as you breathe in and breath out a few times. Feel the rhythm.
2. Now, as you breath in, say in your mind, "breathe in love." As you breathe out, say "breathe out fear."
3. After a few cycles of that, begin to come up with your own words, keeping time with your breathing.
This is what it looked like for me the first time I tried it (I was standing in the shower with a million thoughts spinning around, pressing worry onto my soul). I'd listened to a devotional about breathing in God's love, so I said it to myself... "breathe in love, breathe out fear." I thought of other things I wanted to breathe in and my thoughts focused on coming up with words at the rate of my breathing pattern. When I couldn't think of anything in time, I just repeated the same thing until something else came. Or, I just let random words pop into my head.
This accidental exercise focused my mind enough to slow the spinning thoughts, opening my soul to all the good God wanted to breathe into me through his Spirit.
I have a running list of things I've visualized taking in and letting go of as I breathe--here's a sample (including some very random ones).
Breathe in peace, breathe out striving
Faith--Judgement
Curiosity--Condemnation
Wonder--Boredom
Steady--Hurry
Community--Isolation
Fun--Heaviness
Love for my children--Worrying
Connection--Comparing
Hope--Despair
Life--Death
Blue--Pain
Courage--Avoidance
Rest--Fatigue
Glory—Doubt
Forgiveness—Shame
And so on…
May your rest be sweet,
Alicia