Check

WORDS LIKE LIGHT 

Tuesday,  January 11, 2022

         I spend a lot of time each day ‘checking’ things – calendars, emails, the weather, websites – but I’d like to do more of a different kind of checking. I’d like to pause, now and then, to check – maybe even inspect – the present moment. I’d like to take a break and quietly look over exactly where I am and what’s around me and what’s happening with my thoughts. Every so often I’d like to check – carefully scrutinize – what my eyes are seeing – perhaps the keys on my computer’s keyboard, or the swirls of eggs and onions in a saucepan, or simply the carpet as I come through the house. There are many things more worthy of inspection than email messages or the morning’s weather. I could occasionally inquire into how my shoulders feel, how my feet feel as they rest on the floor in front of my desk, how the warm air from the furnace feels as it rises from the basement. I could carefully look at my thoughts as they arrive in my mind – make them welcome, watch them do their work, and then let them wander away. If a thought asks if I’ve checked my email, I could say ‘No, but I just checked the clouds, and they are something special right now.’