It's like i have been living in an extended exhale.
It wasn't that alarming or uncomfortable or even noticeable at first.
It's different than putting your hand on a hot stove, in which case the senses are immediately alerted by the intensity of the pain, and your finger's pain receptor neurons hurriedly tell your brain to move your hand from the stove.
The slow, deep, elongated exhale actually feels good for a while- it feels like a release of the toxins, it feels like a slowing down of an anxious and rapidly beating heart.
But if one actually stays in the exhale,
well,
one passes out.
I wonder what actually happens physiologically when that happens.
Is passing out the body's way of trying to get itself to breathe in again? Of saying, "hey, stop it. i want some o2"
Whatever it is that happens isn't my point.
My point is just like I said: I feel like I've been living in that extended exhale... in the depletion of oxygen... in the slow numbing of the senses... in the dangerous delay of my heart beat.
And then the Lord pulled my slumped shoulders back and lifted my chin with his big fatherly hands and blew sweetness back into my lungs.
And invited me to drink in all that he has for me, to be fully present to every breath, to inhale just as deeply as I exhale.
I left job 1 today and got to job 2 with plenty of time to spare. I had my book, but it felt wrong to read for pleasure at work. Not because it would be violating work boundaries, but because it would be violating the preciousness of reading for pleasure. Needless to say, I didn't read. Instead, I went into a small prayer room located at job 2. I had come to the room before when I had some extra time, to either pray or finish a phone conversation with one of my sisters. This time I noticed two women in one corner. I couldn't hear what they were talking about, but there was something about sitting in that room and hearing the softness of their voices that was peaceful. It might have spoken to the same part of me that has always had an easier time falling asleep to the sound of someone (typing, talking, reading). I think it also has to do with living in the rhythm of exhale-inhale... deep breaths out followed by deep breaths in. The result is this warm buzzing in my soul. It's the kind of feeling I used to only be able to experience when being around people who held the warm humming of peace in their own hearts. Today I felt it in me, and it felt like taking in a breath from heaven.
On my drive home, I plugged my iPod into my car radio and this pleasant little Nat King Cole melody started to play. I'm not sure why, because earlier in the day I was listening from a completely different playlist. One of my favorite weather things was happening too: I could see the dirty gray rain clouds rain down in front of the pale yellow dusky sky against the backdrop of the mountains. There's just enough light to not need your car lights, and the rain clouds almost seem like a canopy, holding in the cozy of the evening. And I thought for a moment that maybe what I was feeling and experiencing was from the Lord... that it was a picture of his invitation to me to drink in all that he has for me.
"Leigh Anne.... I love you for sentimental reasons, I hope you do believe me, I'll give you my heart. I love you, and you alone were meant for me, please give your loving heart to me, and say we'll never part."
