Finding Rhythm

I've been thinking about this a lot lately. I find it entering my conversations and tossing the words around in comments and posts.

I don't know that I've completely found my rhythm yet, but I think I'm getting there.

For a long time, I thought that routines didn't work for me. That it was best if I took things a moment at a time. I spent a lot of years stressed and frustrated and always scrambling for something.

Over the last few years, I have been falling into a sort of rhythm in my life. It's still shaping, it will probably always be changing - liquid. Flexible. But I am feeling it, definitely. I become more calm, more centered, more productive.

This past weekend, I wasn't feeling that way. My work schedule had changed a bit, a few of us were ill, I just couldn't seem to get things together. Couldn't get motivated. I've just felt out of sorts, emotional and tired. I fell out of our rhythm, out of our routine.

It's nothing written down, no guidelines really. It's like a groove, a dance with life. It's the continuity of the every day tasks. Gathering wood, stoking the fire, preparing food. The kids showers before breakfast, packing lunches. It's morning coffee, afternoon tea. The sun filtering through the front windows in the late afternoon.

I think that maybe the more you go through your day aware, instead of just through motions - the better chance you have of falling into place with things.

What do you consider the rhythm in your life? Is it your routines, are they strict? Is it the freedom of not having routines? What makes you feel present and aware and in tune with your life?