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There’s taking a break and then there’s taking a break.  

For most of us Christmas does not fit the definition of a break but rather simply an altered version of our escalated pre-Christmas frenzy.  The crazy end of year work wrap up replaced by the equally crazy Christmas to do list…the same underpinning mantra pervades both…” I must, I must”.  But when all the pressies and eating is done the pace usually eases off a tad.  I felt a wave of relief just having Christmas day behind me.  Suddenly it seemed I was on holidays…still upright, still going through all the usual paces of looking after kids and elderly parents and occasionally attending to a work issue but the relative slowness was noticeable and welcome.

Then something radical happened.  I went away.  

I was already away, in the sense I was interstate at my parent’s house but we travelled just 30 mins further down the coast to an unknown little rental house by the Rye back beach just with my kids and one of my oldest nearest and dearest mates for a few days. Out of the familiar and all the ‘musts’, ‘shoulds’ and habituations that come with it, off the grid with no computer, no phone (by chance I had forgotten my charger) and to boot the clock in our little hideaway didn’t work!  Aaahhhhhh timelessness found.

We sat, we lay, we read, we wandered the back beach for hours exploring rockpools and caves and I had a wonderful sensation as if my feet were sinking into something that I can only describe as the Awake Delta Wave Experience 🙂

I am reminded that of course taking a break is a bit like sleep, we need to progress through the more superficial stages where we remain semi-vigilant, always ready to jump up into action if necessary, until after staying with this slowed relatively restful state for long enough we can progress into deeper stages of relaxation and finally….ahhhhh… hit the delta wave experience of true restoration.

I am wishing you all a truly restorative Awake Delta Wave Experience this festive season and remember it’s not about how long you stay there, it’s just about having one at all 🙂