The Permission to Simply Be

Last weekend, one of my soul sisters and I escaped to a little cabin tucked away in the woods.

When we started looking, we had a pretty simple wish list.

Somewhere surrounded by trees.

Somewhere on the water.

Somewhere quiet.

Somewhere close enough that we didn't spend the entire weekend driving.

Mostly, we just wanted to unplug.

No agenda.

No itinerary.

No pressure to make the most of every minute.

Just space to breathe.

And that's exactly what we found.

We meditated.

We slept.

We read.

We laughed.

We talked for hours.

But honestly, some of my favorite moments happened in complete silence.

We spent hours sitting on the screened in porch, simply watching nature unfold around us.

The wind moving through the trees.

Birds darting from branch to branch.

The gentle ripples across the lake.

The sounds that are always there but somehow disappear beneath the noise of everyday life.

Nothing spectacular happened that weekend.

And somehow...

It felt like everything happened.

Driving home, I kept thinking about why it felt so different.

It wasn't the cabin.

It wasn't the lake.

It wasn't even the quiet.

It was the permission.

Permission to stop trying to accomplish something.

Permission to not be productive.

Permission to simply exist for a while.

That feeling stayed with me.

Because if I'm being honest, over the last year I've been questioning something.

At what point do we stop building a life and start living it?

For most of my life, I have been a doer.

I love goals.

I love growth.

I love creating things.

There is absolutely nothing wrong with dreaming bigger or building something meaningful.

But somewhere along the way, I realized I had become so good at chasing the next thing that I wasn't fully enjoying the things I had already worked so hard to create.

One of those things is our backyard.

My husband and I have spent countless hours over the years turning it into our sanctuary.

Not because we wanted the perfect yard.

Not because we wanted to impress anyone.

We wanted a place that felt like an exhale.

Now, some of my favorite days happen right there.

Coffee in hand.

Music playing softly.

A good book nearby.

Watching the birds and chipmunks.

Listening to the breeze move through the trees.

Watching the gardens we've spent years planting come alive.

Not accomplishing anything.

Just being.

One of my soul sisters, Kim, has a phrase she uses that I absolutely love.

She calls it Ordinary Joy.

The first time I heard those words, I smiled because they perfectly describe what I've been feeling.

The quiet joy found in simple moments we often overlook.

For years, I thought every weekend needed a purpose.

Something scheduled.

Something planned.

Somewhere to be.

Now?

I'm over it.

I don't want every weekend booked.

I don't want every hour spoken for.

I don't want to spend my life racing from one obligation to the next.

Some of my favorite days now are the ones with absolutely no plan at all.

Game day decisions.

No itinerary.

No expectations.

Just waking up and asking...

"What feels good today?"

This past winter, for the first time, I gave myself a thirty day break.

No sessions.

No pressure to create.

No business obligations.

Just time to rest, reflect on the year behind me, dream about the year ahead, and reconnect with myself.

It taught me something I didn't know I needed to learn.

Our nervous systems weren't designed to live in a constant state of doing.

They were designed to experience life, too.

Maybe that's why this cabin weekend touched me so deeply.

It reminded me that life isn't only found in the milestones.

It's in the quiet conversations.

The morning coffee.

The birdsong.

The screened in porch.

The laughter.

The sunsets.

The backyard sanctuary you've spent years creating.

The people sitting beside you.

No one reaches the end of life wishing they had answered one more email or cleaned the house one more time.

The dishes can wait.

The weeds will still be there tomorrow.

The laundry isn't keeping score.

The people who love you aren't coming to inspect your home.

They're coming to spend time with you.

To laugh with you.

To make memories with you.

Maybe that's what this season is teaching me.

We spend so much of our lives building.

Building careers.

Building businesses.

Building homes.

Building families.

Building dreams.

But eventually there comes a moment when we have to stop and sit in what we've built.

Not because we're done growing.

But because this moment deserves our attention, too.

Life isn't happening someday.

It's happening right now.

And I don't want to miss it.

With gratitude,

Jamie Lynn