Grace

After a massage, I always feel more thoughtful, deeper, as though my view of the world has slowed and each sensation comes through without distraction. I feel more connected.

Is it the process of the massage itself – the physiology stirred into action by all that deep-tissue release? Is it the fact that for the duration of one hour I have stopped? That I have halted? That rather than juggling so many things my job is simply to breathe?

I didn’t pick a word of the year, but one seems to have wandered along and picked me. The word is grace. It strikes me as an odd one. What seems to call out to me is the desire of moving through my life – relationships, tasks, responsibilities – with a grounded and beautiful grace.

Perhaps it is the illusion of an unharried life that calls.

There is a scene in ‘The Princess Diaries’ movie that I suddenly remember: The Queen says, “A queen never hurries. She hastens.”

This is what I want. To move through my life with calmness and a feeling of space and time. To hasten but never hurry, and never get harried. To keep my feelings about the tasks at hand in a cheerful and productive frame. To breathe deeply and finish a task before moving on.

It would make me a better role model for my kids. It would make my inner life more centred.

Grace.

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