Creative prompt: Loading cargo, dropping cargo

What do you need to sustain your ability to care?

Cargo dropped by Barnstable Harbor.

In our last In Tending online gathering, we talked about guiding the “boats” of our attention away from where they tend to be — tied up to the islands of work, family, social obligations, free-floating future anxieties — and back home to our bodies in the present moment. (We used this meditation to do so.)

Sometimes, engaging in this meditative practice is enough for me. After enjoying a moment of stillness, I feel refreshed and able to return to the fray.

But sometimes, I benefit from lingering a little longer in that harbor, even after my meditation timer has gone off, signaling I’m free to go.

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Quick housekeeping note: We’ll be meeting again to meditate on December 2, at 11am PST/2pm EST/7pm GMT. To get on the list for the Zoom link, please click here to fill out our short sign-up form!

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After I’ve come home to the body, I find I am also more attuned to its needs, requests—and even, sometimes, its straight-up demands. Things that weren’t so easy to notice, when the vessel of my attention was so far out to sea.

Meredith, my fearless fellow sailor, feels the same. So during our last session, she offered this simple four-word journaling prompt below for us to consider in writing after our meditation and discussion.

What.

Do.

You.

Need?

Meredith, in her delightfully cozy home.

Loading cargo, dropping cargo

As Meredith shares:

We spend a lot of time attempting to intuit what the other people around us need from us – and then we orient our boats in that direction. 

But we can miss the opportunity we have here in the harbor to actually pull the necessary supplies on board. We need water. We need food. We need supplies. 

What kinds of resources do we know we need, to help us sustain ourselves and our efforts to care?

If we don’t know, can we stop and listen now for that? 

And/or – are you carrying cargo for somebody else that you’d like to put down? What is that? 

I tried this prompt myself, and the results surprised me in their simplicity. Sometimes we caregivers get so stymied when someone asks us, “What do you need?” As if it would take us days and days to make a list, as if the conditions were completely out of our reach. As mom-writer Ashley Locke put it in this interview:

In the same way that sometimes you know that you need to get to the gym, and all you have to do is put your sneakers on, but you just can’t put your sneakers on — that is sometimes how it feels to be a mom, to know that you should just pick up the phone and ask for help, and yet you just can’t ask for help.

Yet when we ask our bodies, and not just our brains, it turns out that they often have very have-able dreams.

Here’s what came up for me:

I need... 

Comfortable shoes.

Soft ones.

I have miles left to go.

I need pants that aren't so dang tight.

That fit the body I have now.

That help her know

how proud I am of her. 

I need a hug, and a place

to lay my head. 

I need sleep, so that I don't need

to drink so much coffee. 

…But I also need coffee. 

I need others to come to me,

because I'm tired of traveling. 

Or at least to meet me halfway. 

Sometimes, I need to be at home. 

I need this storm to be over. 

I know it won't be over anytime soon. 

So I need to carry this inside of me too:

the reason why I am on the water in the first place. 

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Below, I’ve used the paywall to create a private space where we can talk about what came up for us with this prompt. If you’re currently a free subscriber and you’d like to join the discussion, we invite you to donate to the cause ($5/month, $30/year). You can always drop cargo later.

Reminder: Our next online meet-up is Monday, December 2, at 11am PST/2pm EST/7pm GMT. Can’t make it? Fill out this form to get on the invite list for the next one!