Making Friends With Laziness

 Making Friends With Laziness ©2021 Joan M. Newcomb, CPC

At my brother's Physical Therapist there was a stature of a young monk sitting with Ganesha, the Hindu Elephant God. Or so I thought. Ganesha represents luck and abundance. 

I took a photo and sent it to my husband, who texted back that it's not Ganesha at all, but a Buddhist story, the young monk is seeking enlightenment and the black elephant represents laziness. Eventually it turns white after the monk overcomes it.

 It seemed fitting for a PT's office, my brother needs to do a lot of hard, physical work to overcome his disability. It's an uphill battle as he's naturally sedentary. 

But today I see it from another perspective. 

Today I'm seeing it from the perspective of self care. I'm notoriously bad at self care. The only time I took a nap in recent memory was after my second COVID vaccine. On the other hand, my brother takes frequent naps. He needs them for his stroke-injured brain to recover.

Making friends with laziness doesn't mean letting it take over your life. It's allowing for balance. Inactivity can be restorative. Resisting laziness can mean you spin your wheels with a lot of activity that doesn't really get you anywhere.  Often you need to stop trying to make things happen in order for things to manifest in a bigger way, beyond your own imagination.