Waking up in the morning has never been a strong suit of mine. I have always aspired to be a morning person, someone who wakes up with the sun, has a slow morning of coffee and reflection before starting the day. I am envious of those who seem to naturally wake up early- no alarm or grumbling and stumbling out of bed. My dad was like that, he was up before everyone else and had already had a full day before I even had my first sip of tea or coffee. He didn’t try, it was not something he worked hard at, he simply was a person who got up early..
When I wake up in the mornings recently, it is with a sense of anxiety; like I am running late for something important but I can’t remember what. That I have missed out, and am behind and need to catch up. It does not matter if I don’t have anything that I am actually late for, the feeling is there and it always takes me a while to get over the tightness and tension in my body before I feel like I am at any sort of baseline. It is typically not a panic inducing feeling, more so just an unease within myself.
The more I started noticing and thinking about these feelings, the more I realized the feelings are stemming from the fact that I want to do so much more with my mornings. For centuries philosophers to writers to everyone in between has talked about the power of waking up early in the morning. I’ve even experienced it myself. When my dad was in the hospital, I visited him everyday before I would start work. His visiting hours did not start until 9, and I wanted to work out before as well. The mornings where I would do it all, workout then go see my dad, I felt the most productive. I felt fulfilled, like I was living in alignment with my values. I was taking the actions that allowed me to feel physically better about myself and mentally more at ease in my life. It’s ironic in a sense, it was one of the most difficult times in my outer world, but I felt the most balanced in my inner world.
Being able to step back and view my anxious thoughts as a signal from my body has been a new experience for me. It usually just sounds like a five alarm fire where I can’t figure out where the fire actually is. This time, it came to me pretty clearly as I was waking up one morning, feeling off and slightly down, that the reason I am feeling this is because I am out of alignment with what my highest self would be doing.
I am under no illusion that waking up earlier, going for a walk, and getting work done will be easier than laying in bed drifting in and out of sleep. I allow myself too much grace when it comes to being comfortable though, and living out the desired actions of my highest self will eventually lead to even better results. All of this has got me thinking though, is a lot of anxiety, depression, low mood, whatever the feeling you want to call it, simply because we are not living in accordance with what our consciousness wants? I am a firm believer in trusting one’s own intuition, so maybe it is time to shake up my routine and take the steps towards my best self.
Maybe living out of alignment with what my consciousness knows it best is actually what is causing this anxiety. Maybe living by the cycle of the sun, like we did for thousands of years, is what my body is trying to tell me. Maybe, just maybe, trusting the voice inside of me that has been shoved down is what will lead me to a more harmonious life.
