Recalibration

You can’t pour from an empty cup.

Travis has been home for nearly five months.  Time is intangible, it seems like he’s been home for merely weeks and that he never actually left all at the same time.

Relationships work really well when you both are able to pour into it rather than need something from it.  While we were very relieved to be reunited in December, we both were incredibly depleted in very different yet very real ways.  Add that to the fact we’d been apart for 11 months under the most stressful of circumstances, and neither of us were the individuals we had been when we hugged and kissed goodbye on January 11, 2023.

It was very apparent we both needed a period to recalibrate…to each other, to ourselves, to life.

And honestly, I wasn’t too interested in this.  After the lengthy trip through nearly the two years since this nightmare began, I was really quite ready for something to simply fall into place and be easy.  For a thing to not require my attention, energy, or time to thrive.  What I see now in hindsight, I wanted me to thrive without requiring attention, energy, or time.  Life simply doesn’t work like that, but I gave it the good ole college try just to be sure.

After Travis returned, I poured a lot of my attention into my healing arts business, Travis, and my family as we navigated my Grandma’s passing.  Continuously giving external of myself thinking that investment would be returned to me eventually, and believing I was filling my own cup.

One day I received a card in the mail from a dear friend who acknowledged support and outreach stops as the chapters of life page forward, but her support was unending in prayers, positivity, and good vibes and always is just a phone call away.

The tears leaked from my eyes as I took a long moment of pause.  This card, this moment, the reflections from someone else’s wise experience through the alleys of grief allowed me to see my cup was empty and had been for some time.  Each day the self-care I indulged in filled my cup a little, and by day’s end I poured that out unto someone else.  We know we can’t pour from an empty cup, but sometimes we don’t have the ability to accurately access the true condition of our cup.  This was my reality check.

Setting self-delusion aside, I began to focus on what I needed, and how I could make those things my reality.  I discovered more times than not, I was the one thing standing in the way of what I needed.  I don’t need rest I would tell myself as I worked on the landscaping and then slept through my alarm the next morning.  Besides, if I stopped spinning all the plates, wouldn’t the plates crash and break?

With practice I am improving my skills to fill my cup so I can return to pouring from an overflowing cup.  In the places and spaces I thought life or our relationship might fall apart if I stopped doing the things, I have discovered the opposite to be true.

Travis and I have found the new version of our rhythm for living life together.  And the simple pleasures mean so much more than I ever knew possible.  I recently sat in awe with such deep gratitude for him cutting the grass.  We went on a sushi date for the first time in nearly two years, and he poked fun at me as only he can do for not eating all of the rice on the sushi rolls.  He claims it’s my attempt to save 27 calories.  It’s not, but it’s funnier than the simple fact I am particular about my rice to fish ratio.  We sat together in church holding hands.  He’s hugged me and held me as I wept my way through grief.  I slugged away 600 sledgehammer swings to the tire in our backyard–the first time in years this felt like play rather than therapy. 

There’s no better time than now to fill your own cup especially as we traverse this great evolution taking place in the world around us.  I asked a wise friend and colleague what it looks like to fill your own cup, and she offered some very simple and sound advice: 

Change the question ‘What do I need to do?’ to ‘What do I want to do?‘  And then do that.  (If you were told no a lot as a kiddo or if you have a strong game of delayed gratification this one is going to be much trickier for you than it sounds!) 

May your overflowing cup bring you great joy, peace, and pleasure!  And if you want support navigating your own recalibration and reclamation, lets connect! 

Peace & Love, 

Janessa