“Why do you go away? So that you can come back. So that you can see the place you came from with new eyes and extra colors.” – Terry Pratchett
Last week my son and his wife announced that they were getting me out of town so I could detach from the chaos and have a few days away from things to just hide out and breathe in some fresh air. With their encouragement, my husband and I packed our bags and drove out to a ranch nestled in the side of the mountains where we met my son and his wife and our grandbaby for an extended weekend away at a cabin.
It is amazing that one can actually go without access to the internet for a few days and not die of technology depravation. I think I’d forgotten that was possible so I’m really grateful my son and his were able to remind me.
With all the craziness of life, sometimes when you are in the very thickest of things, the very best thing you can actually do is to just get yourself away from it all for a few days, secluding yourself from all the cares of normal life, in order to give yourself the opportunity to clear your mind and take a minute to just think. And I have to say that it’s incredible to recognize how very little time we normally get in our typical day to just sit back and think….
As we were walking down a pathway on this mountainside we were staying on I was amazed at how good it felt just to feel the sun on my face and to breathe the fresh mountain air. It sounds like such a simple thing, yet I realized it was something I haven’t done in far too long. You see, I tend to be a doer, so I am always going nearly a million miles an hour working on a million different things – and although it always seems like a good idea at the time because it lets me feel like I am being productive and getting a bunch done – I remembered how powerful it is to take a minute to step away from everything. It’s powerful because it allows you to detach from all the emotions and re-evaluate everything from a very logical and practical view. It provides a much needed perspective that you just cannot get when you are right in the thick of things.
Am I excited to come back and get hit with everything I missed while I was gone – No. But was getting away and spending time with my family worth it? Absolutely.
The best part of getting away is that you come back and see things with new eyes and extra colors.
~Amy Rees Anderson
