To Do: Nada

Sometimes I get so caught up in all the things I need to do. Clean out the refrigerator. Rake the leaves. Go grocery shopping. Organize my home office. And on and on…ad infinitum. Literally, there are hundreds of things that I need to do. Hundreds. And really, I don’t think I have time enough left on this planet to do them all, even if I live to 101.

            I remember my mother talking about this same stuff. She desperately wanted to clean out her attic, basement, and all her kitchen cabinets before she died. She swore that she would not leave her children with a house full of junk (my mother never even threw out the rock collection I had in first grade!).

And, in the end she did leave us a house full of “junk.” But we didn’t mind--because my mother, deep inside, knew and lived what was important. Her family. The birds outside the window. The day.

            Yet, she worried that she wasn’t doing the right thing.

            And now, here I am following in her footsteps, berating myself for not doing so, so many things that I should be doing every day to clear the path for the future.

            But…should we be clearing the path for the future?

            Actually, when I really think of what I truly should be doing, organizing and cleaning are not on the list, which sort of goes like this:

            *Get back to journaling. It’s been too long—and, after all, I’m a writer!

            *Listen to more classical music (and other music, too).

            *Walk more.

            *Do more yoga.

            *Live my yoga.

            *Be more grateful.

            *Get outside.

            *Write down dreams.

            *Meditate every day.

            *Be alone.

            *Think and don’t think.

            *Connect with others.

            If your to-do list, like mine was, is cluttered with nonsense, I hope you’ll re-consider and make a new one. What really needs to be done? What is really important? (Hurricanes make us think like this!) I’ll bet if we all revised our to-do lists most of what’s on there would go in what we used to call the “circular file.”

Après Sandy, join me; revise and revamp, and this time make your to-do list reflect whatever is most important to your life, your love, and your spirit.