How do we find Focus?

Today, I cannot focus on any one particular thing.

Being a woman and a creative (and a sensitive one at that) means I’m passionate and tuned in, easily turned onto the causes of our time.

The most pressing issues challenge me daily—shall I focus on the gun violence issue? How about the dismantling of the EPA by extremist Scott Pruitt? What about the predator policies in Alaska—killing dozens of gray wolves, grizzly, and black bears, and its effects on their populations? And what about the abolition of gas chambers as a measure of “controlling” homeless dog and cat populations?

If you’re like me, the mind is easily overwhelmed every time I turn the computer on. I engage in an hourly struggle to choose one particular cause and stay with it.

Our daily world has been created to bombard our senses and overwhelm our instincts.

There must be a better way…

Intuitively, I know there is. Here’s one thing that helps me hear my voice when the FB notifications are screaming, the e-mail is overflowing and the pop-ups just won’t end:

I turn it off. I tune it out, and write. Get out a blank sheet of paper and a pencil, and spend 15 minutes writing. I can see the process that is my mind out there on the page, looking back at me. As the words leave my brain and fall onto the page, I do a mind walk through some crazy, internal process to get to a place of clarity and sense of grounded direction.

Meditation in motion.

When I do this, something rises up to the surface that is the most important thing I must write about on that particular day—and it nearly always falls within the realms of that which I cherish the most: nature and animals. For you, perhaps it’s your children and your ability to provide a safe, pollutant-free, and healthy environment for them. Or maybe it’s advocating for the existence of elephants in Africa.

We all have our concerns. No matter what they are, the important things become clearer in the process of writing them out. My mind actually slows down. A direction appears where I had gotten stuck at an intersection. The words begin to flow, and the notifications or texts or updates all fall into the backdrop.

Some feel that writing provides direct connection to the soul. I resonate with that belief.

To thrive in our present reality, enlightened women and men must find ways of tuning into ourselves beyond the noise.

There’s a common thread for all of us: We are in tune with the suffering around us, and we love the beautiful forms of life here on earth. We feel the call to protect and advocate for it, in whichever form it manifests. In the political turmoil that is our present day reality, there exist volumes to wade through to find what’s most important.

The common ground is simple. It’s about the sacred feminine: the honoring of life and the beauty of it in all its manifestations. Creating it, nurturing and protecting it. When the shadow side feels large enough to overwhelm, making it impossible to choose, just tune back into that grounded place by creating quiet, safe space, to write a page or two, and see what rises up for you.

Namaste.

~

Author: Denise Boehler
Image: Mari Lezhava/Unsplash
Editor: Caitlin Oriel 

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