Buckets of Water
It is Monday morning and we have entered the third week of school. I am startled by my alarm, which is unusual—I usually wake up before it goes off. Feeling a bit jolted, I survey the scene of my body with a quick scan, only to find an instant heaviness as my mind starts to reel.
The flood gates open and I find myself drowning in to-do lists and the harsh reorientation to life as I know it. But strangely, it's purely one-sided, only from one point of view. I'm filled with reminders of what needs to be done and accomplished today, moments of worry and angst about where I am versus where I want to be, and of course, slivers of the past—as if a narrator is setting up the scene of my life, reminding me of who I am by showing me who I was. There's nothing of the present moment here, the very moment I'm actually in.
I get out of bed already feeling sluggish after a full night's sleep. The overwhelm of this life that my inner narrator has constructed starts to creep in and almost brings me into slight panic mode before I've even done anything that day. Minute three of my day and I think, "I'm doomed." This does not feel good at all. I feel deflated and dejected, and I haven't even begun.
I could have woken up feeling lighter, curious, and excited about what the day might bring. Instead, I feel weighted down by everything that floods my mind before I'm even fully conscious.
I sit up in my bed and swing my legs over to the side to try and launch myself into the day, and I look down to see what looks like two large buckets by my bedside. I feel compelled to pick them up as if I've been instructed to carry them around all day long, no matter what, like my existence depends on it—even though no one has instructed me to do so other than myself.
As I lift them, I realize they contain everything that made me feel heavy the moment I woke up: those to-do lists, the worry and angst about where I am versus where I want to be, the harsh reorientation to life as I know it, and all those slivers of the past that my inner narrator uses to remind me who I am. Mixed in are moments, artifacts, feelings, events, rules, identities, and experiences from a time that has already come and gone—all of it swirling together like water that's fluid and ready to spill.
By patterned thinking alone, I pick up these buckets filled with the water of my past, splashing and sloshing and sometimes spilling into every activity of my day: the carpool, my workout, my work, my personal time, my eating, my interactions. They serve as an unrelenting reminder of who I am, as if I needed to know. And it feels daunting and puts me on edge.
As if carrying heavy buckets isn't hard enough, I also feel worried about spilling the water and making a mess. I feel as though I want to hide the fact that I am carrying around these awkward containers that have made it impossible to be successful in anything that I do—though I don't even know what success looks like when you're lugging buckets of water everywhere—but it's absolutely impossible to hide. They're heavy, distracting, and, to some degree, painful as the handles hurt my hands from their weight. They bump into my legs as I walk, causing tiny little scrapes.
I spend most of my day carrying around these buckets of water, which has not made for a pleasant day. And suddenly, I stop. I realize that I have not needed one thing from them. I realize that they've provided me not one iota of help in making my day more easeful, enjoyable, or successful. I start to wonder: could I just put the buckets down? What am I getting from carrying these buckets of the watery past around? What are they really for?
I set the buckets down for a moment. Instantly, I find relief. Just by the laws of physics, the circulation comes back into my hands and I feel lighter. I put my hands on my hips and look around, and I know that I'm faced with a choice. One that is only up to me.
Here's the choice: Is there enough in the present moment for me to let go of the past?
It becomes a simple choice, with an even simpler answer. Carry heavy buckets of water that contain everything that takes us away from the present moment, or be in the only moment where everything new lives.
We can't hand-select what we want from our past to come through and still live in the present moment. It's an either-or situation: past or present, buckets or no buckets.
The buckets of our past will always be there, waiting by our bedside, if we need them. They're not going anywhere, and that's okay. The beautiful truth remains that the choice is always ours to make. We can choose to step into each new day feeling saddled and restrained by our past, or we can enter each new day unencumbered, believing and trusting that the present moment holds everything we need to create the best day ever.
Hi, I’m Sara Rose.
Explore my blog to uncover the extraordinary transformations hidden in everyday moments.
