opportunities

I'm just back from a very intense, emotional, inspiring, challenging, and exhausting five-day training for the alternative spring break programs I used to run when I lived in NYC. Somehow, though I'm not sure how I pulled this off (aka got the extra time off of work), I am going to be a group leader for them this year, which I am thrilled about. I'm going to Nicaragua in March and somewhere else to be determined later in the year (aka when I have vacation time again).

The past five days were tough. Going back as an "outsider" to the programs I used to coordinate full-time, that I gave most of my time and heart to, laughed and cried and occasionally pulled out my hair over, was, frankly, weird. Seeing the ways things have improved, or not, was fulfilling and frustrating. Trying not to step on toes and jump in with answers that are still deeply ingrained in my brain because of the hours/days/weeks of thinking through forms and policies and systems from every possible angle (or so I thought) was a challenge that, frankly, I failed a lot of the time. I didn't have the emotional energy to figure out how to say things in the kindest way, and I think I put my foot in my mouth a lot. I felt like I talked too much. The energy we get out of things like this has much to do with the energy we bring to it, and mine was... uncertain.

The thing is, I feel like I've been moving 100 miles a minute for the past month or so, and had to drive just about that fast to get to New Jersey last Wednesday in time to see my cousin (who I haven't seen in years) for a couple of hours before she and her baby son (who I'd never met) boarded their plane back to Israel. And then there was the rushing to the bus to Manhattan and rushing to the office. I came into the training feeling like it was another task I needed to race through.

But you can't race through something like that, and you don't want to when you look around the room and see, truly, the coolest group of people you will have the privilege of sharing space with all year. And that's tough too - wanting to both reconnect with old friends and make new friends and learn everyone's life stories (because DAMN they are cool - the elite Ironman triathlete who passionately and creatively teaches middle school in San Francisco, the 23-year-old fellow Macalester alumna who has already led more wilderness and international group trips than most informal educators twice her age, and is certainly wiser than most of us can ever hope to be... etc., etc.) in the too-few 10-minute breaks scattered between intense learning and teaching and skill-building and policy-ingraining hours. There's just not enough time.

And that's sort of the problem I have with life in general, I guess - not enough time for all the cool things I want to do. Not enough space in the week. (Not enough space in me?) This is obviously a totally privileged problem to have. But it's still a problem.

One of my role models is a fabulous Hillel rabbi in San Diego who, much to my delight, was also at this training as she's decided to become a group leader after working for several years to run these programs from the Hillel side of things. As we were (hurriedly, of course) catching up, she mentioned her recent growing interest in mindfulness meditation practice, and how it's allowed her to be kinder not just to others but to herself, which is something many of us forget to be. And I have to admit that I'm not feeling very mindful or present or compassionate toward myself right now, and I'm not quite sure how to get there.

But as my friend pointed out, that's the great thing about mindfulness - every minute is an opportunity to practice.