What Does It Look Like to Choose Ease?

"You do not have to be good.
You do not have to walk on your knees
for a hundred miles through the desert repenting.
You only have to let the soft animal of your body love what it loves."
​— Mary Oliver from Wild Geese

My word for the year is ease. To me it's a comforting and wonderful word - when I hear it I feel my body relax into it. In fact, I tried several other really good words, creativity, purpose, inspiration, and more. All amazing words, and ease was the only one that gave me that feeling of “yes, that’s it.” And I say this after a day of running from thing to thing to one more thing. Plus trying to remember how to create 1099's and then posting this tonight to achieve my goal of blogging for the 5th month in a row! It hasn't felt particularly easeful.​ Hmmm ... I wonder what it looks like to choose ease? 
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It sounds so good in theory and in reality, I don't want to choose period. I want to do all the things - I'm lucky and privileged enough to be capable, healthy, and loving what I’m up to, therefore I should be able to do it all. Right?! And that's just it, we can't do it all and we includes me. I cannot do it all! Just saying that and letting go of the angst around trying to do it all feels a bit easeful. 

​I "only have to let the soft animal of my body love what it loves" as Mary Oliver says in her poem Wild Geese. Maybe that's what ease is. It could be and I want to believe it. Bringing me back to the question of how do I choose it?
 
Interestingly as I was writing this post, I looked up quotes about ease. Wow, not a lot of uplifting words in these quotes. Ease is not something that we allow much less celebrate. No wonder I don’t naturally choose it! The first quote that Google showed me is Winston Churchill's "This is no time for ease and comfort. It is time to dare and endure." Assuming that one was from wartime. Then there is Theodore Roosevelt's "Never throughout history has a man who lived a life of ease left a name worth remembering." Ouch! Starting to question this word of the year. 🤣 And then I say the word again, ease, ease. Ah, it feels peaceful and present. I believe this is a different kind of ease than Churchill and Roosevelt were talking about. It’s not about leisure or laziness. (My resistance to and discomfort with laziness is a whole other story, in fact it’s probably another blog post, maybe next month! 😉)  
 
My word ease, the one that relaxes me, is the kind of ease that comes from a deep connection with my authentic self and sense of belonging in the world. It comes from really and wholly knowing I am enough – knowing in my mind, my heart, and my body. And maybe that’s the thing about it, it’s as much about letting go, allowing, dare I say easing into ease as it is about choosing ease. The choice is in the acceptance, and the acceptance happens when I come back to presence (my October blog post), notice without judgment (i.e., awareness, my November blog post), and most importantly nurture and stand up for myself (i.e., self-compassion, my December blog post). It’s the inside layers of my leading from the inside out model that open up the possibility of ease. It’s letting go of the should’s and have to’s and “letting the soft animal of my body love what it loves.” Choosing ease is simple (and not easy), it’s connecting to me, stepping into the space that emerges when I accept and love what I love (including me). That's the space of authentic aliveness, it's the space of rest and rejuvenation too. That’s what I call ease -- more of that in 2024 please! Looking for some more ease for yourself, let’s connect.