Be Still, Be Stiller Yet

It's 2022 and the CDC says go back to work. Boss says blow your nose, stifle your cough, pick yourself up, and keep going. Go harder. Go further. Go more. Produce. We need growth. We need profit. Expansion and accumulation. Don't stop. Or slow down. Or think for yourself.

Don't take your time because it's borrowed and it's owed. Rent is due. Bills are due. Hustle, hustle. Grind, grind. New year, new everything except for the order of business. That's been the same since global exploitation. That's been the same since massacres for progress. Death for dollars is a fair exchange

Self-help. Self-care. To rejuvenate and regroup. So you can return to work on Monday, fresh enough to give every inch of yourself. Until there's nothing left to give. Until your body's just a shell your mind cannot afford to care for. Find your morning routine. Go to sleep to get up early with the birds who know how to get the first worm. They know it's about getting the worm first, not about enjoying the taste or getting to eat in the first place.

But what if instead, you stopped?

You tied the clock hands up and told time to its face that you weren't buying its bullshit anymore? No longer sold on the marketing ploy of having much means being better, and doing is the point of living.

Every year, on January first, a multitude of humanity feel inclined to do more. Different. To search for what's missing until they can find their own meaning. Little realizing every day is new year's, just with a little less champagne and no one singing Auld Lang Syne.

When faced with an opportunity to go somewhere you don't want to go--party, a job, a catchup with your highschool best friend you stopped relating to in senior year--don't go. Don't answer the phone. Don't text back for the sake of responding. For the reason of not wanting to be disliked. For the fear of missing out.

The truth is everyone is missing out on nothing. All that matters is who you are and how you choose to show up for yourself. How can we know ourselves when we're too busy moving quickly to see our own reflections in bathroom mirrors or car windows? When we talk so much to so many, we can't hear our own thoughts talk back?

Be still.

Be stiller yet.

Let that be your 2022 challenge.

Put that up on the internet. Tell all your friends.

Or better yet,

don't.

Don't say a word of it to anyone. Don't announce or proclaim your access to enlightenment. Don't underestimate the power of silence.

We live in a loud world. A fast planet rushing and dying before our eyes. Slow down to hold the roses. To watch the clouds and wonder, the way you used to wonder. Notice the shades of the sunset and see if you can't hear its quiet peace igniting the sky, beneath the wistful whisper of wind through the sprinkling of trees.

Watch what can be when you don't do a thing. And when you let yourself feel guiltless not doing so.

Nothing lasts forever; certainly not our bodies. So be still. Be stiller yet. Love while you can. Rest as you're able. Ignore emails. Set the priorities that don't matter to "do not disturb". It's not worth breaking your back for your boss. It's not worth breaking your bones to make the machine run.

The machine doesn't care about you.

In the end, what matters is that you were. Not that you did or what you gave.

The machine doesn't deserve your blood anymore.