If I were dropped out of a plane...

"If I were dropped out of a plane into the ocean and told the nearest land was a thousand miles away, I’d still swim."
- Abraham Maslow

This is so true for me. Flashes of perhaps wanting to just sink under the water might have appeared (and will likely still appear) on that inner mental screen, but those are shut off quickly by the absolute necessity of being and doing "whatever it takes" for self-preservation.

I've had three months to think about what self-preservation is to me. Or rather I should say, somewhere in the midst of three months, it occurred to me what I was doing out of self-preservation and what I needed to stop doing in order to actually attain self-preservation. First, it was just staying afloat and that meant keeping my head above water with finishing school, then work, dotting some "i's" and crossing some "t's." Then I began to realize that in my zeal to cover all my bases and not feel the void, I had over-booked myself -- said "Yes" to too much, left no time for basics like laundry and unwinding in fuzzy pajamas with a dog's head resting on my lap.

In the doing of stuff that needs to be done daily, while still trying to fit in the contemplation of the doing of stuff that needs to be done to create order in the shift from the old life to the new, there has to be time allotted for finding happiness and the swim for that safe harbor. In other words, I can't be so busy doing "stuff" that I don't leave time for something I don't want to become a memory...fun.

Psalm 68:5-6
"Father to the fatherless, defender of widows—
this is God, whose dwelling is holy.
God places the lonely in families;
he sets the prisoners free and gives them joy.
But he makes the rebellious live in a sun-scorched land."

Psalm 147:3
He heals the brokenhearted and binds up their wounds.