Easing In
Before anything else, feed yourself something good. Lay down on the floor and stretch, wide and long. Walk somewhere, even if it's just to the corner market, and say good morning to all the guys up early and working there. When the flood of thoughts rises about all the things there are to do, feel in your body which ones bring you joy. Begin there.
Make something. Prepare a good gift. Write something--whatever rises to the top. Feel the rhythm of body and movement and breath and words that drift out like an exhale. Look at your inbox, if you must, and do what you can there before you feel overwhelmed. Take a break. Feed yourself another something good. Refill your water. Open the window. Feel the wood floor under your feet, and rub some oil into your dry skin.
Feel all the things that are undone, survey the messes made and left, the wreckage of things broken in the fray. This is how it feels to be alive. Undone. Unfinished. Try to let it sink in that the work is never done. There are simply moments of pause or clarity, scarce seconds when the plate can find a clear space to rest at the table. Artifacts of our projects and questions, our adventures out and stumbling back home laying like rubble all around us, testifying to the living that is happening in our times and in our spaces.
Let the walls and this sturdy floor hold it all, and let them hold you as your legs steady themselves again, for just a moment, on moving ground.