I fell last week. Tripped on a stair and fell right onto a cement pad. As people around me rushed to see if I was ok, embarrassment swept over me. “I am fine,” I said with not wanting to make a fuss. I limped off to my car only to discover that I had really bruised myself.
As I drove home with my leg swelling a throbbing I began to wonder, why did I do this? The step wasn’t wet or icy. So here is what I came up with.
- I need to slow down.
In this fast paced world, we all need to slow down sometimes. I am guilty of rushing more times than I can count. My fall forced me to slow down and take a look at what I was doing.
- My body is a temple
My body is something I take for granted often. It is not until something is not working correctly that we appreciate it. As I sat icing my leg I realized how much my body does for me every day. What an amazing thing the body is. The painful bruises woke me up to remember to take care of myself. Like so many care givers my usual focus is others and not myself. Every time I step and the pain in my leg flares I now remember to care for it.
- Life can change in an instant and every moment is precious
This may be cliché however it is worth saying. I was going along not paying attention and I received the opportunity to wake up. To remember to stop and enjoy life. For the weeks before my fall I had been working 12 hour days, not leaving enough time to enjoy the beautiful fall foliage of New England.
- It is time to refocus
There were a few areas of my life that I had been ignoring. As I sat with my leg up, I realized that I cannot continue to ignore them. I am a firm believer that if you ignore things enough the universe will continue to bring it up over and over again, less subtly as it goes. I took the down time as an opportunity to begin to make a plan to deal with the things that I had been ignoring. This time I really thought about the plan. My usual is to dive in and try to tackle all the problems at once until I become overwhelmed and can’t deal anymore. This time I made a plan for each item and realized that there are only 24 hours in a day.
Life always gives us opportunities to wake up and get back on track. Some are more direct than others. I hope next time that I start getting off track and there will be a next time, that I can see it earlier before I bruise myself again.
Kelsey, Towards the end of June I had a fall on my bike. Basically, it was a vertical fall on my side onto the head of my femur causing a displacement fracture. The back wheel slipped out during a very slow but sharp 90 degree turn. For me there were about six or more contributory conditions, only three under my control, and several seemed to “guide” me into the situation. It seemed like if any one of them had not happened, the fall would not have either. Now about four months later I’m back on my bike with a complete hip replacement. I have taken care of the things that I have under my control, but now a bit more uncertain about those things that are not. A state of non-anxiety and non-peace if that makes sense. I hope all is well with you again.