I let my thoughts fly with no bounds. If I let it be, I could be dangerously close to committing something unreal. I guess that was why God had sent me a child. So that I can’t dwell in my thoughts too much. When I had all the freedom to think all my thoughts, I was as reckless as one could ever wish to be. I have no difficulty staying home full-time under a lockdown partly because I have wondered around so much in my youth.

Now the constant chatter of my toddler fills my brain ALL DAY. No kidding. With the schools closed, I am home with my curious child who inherited my mind-wondering skill. The good news is, I have learned that my daughter mostly vents her thoughts out loud and clearly. She speaks about them. She loves to tell me about them. I was an opposite child. I kept all my thoughts inside, pondering, writing, reliving, and reinventing. Even as a child, I was so quiet in my own created world, reading, writing, and daydreaming. Then I grew up to be an adult that was guided by the thoughts in her head.

I am learning that I do not need to act out all my thoughts. (Yes, I am learning that just now). I was so compulsive about following the stories in my head that if some thought occurred, I had to act on it right away. For example, if I had a sudden vision of myself drinking coffee at Waikoloa village, then I would immediately get on my road bike and ride almost 40 miles along the Ali’i Drive and Queen Ka’ahumanu Highway. I’d get there, just to drink coffee at Starbucks and then ride another 40 miles back home. If I don’t act it out, what follows is this nagging feeling of guilt that won’t stop torturing me until I perform the thought.

And so, last night in bed, when my daughter expressed her frustration because she can’t stop thinking about drawing this picture that she has in her head, I calmly told her she can envision it in her head and play with her thought but she does not have to act on it right away. I told her, she can do it the first thing in the morning when she wakes up but now is the bed time. I secretly regretted after she fell asleep a while later wondering if I was suppressing her creativity.

My daughter jumped out of her bed as soon as she opened her eyes and ran to the craft room. She had a few white papers messily spread out on the floor. She had a bag full of coloring pencils. I simply thought, ‘Oh, she’s drawing something’, and continued making my morning coffee. Then about thirty minutes later, after giving me enough time to enjoy my quiet morning routine, my daughter ran toward me with so much excitement. She said, “Mommy, I made the drawing that I was thinking about making last night!” She had not forgotten!

And it was a picture of a beautiful unicorn in rainbow colors. Picturing my daughter with a rainbow unicorn dream in her head made my heart feel so full and warm.

Oh, how I wish I could go to bed with such a beautiful vision. Instead, my last thought before I slept last night was on Coronavirus. It’s my last thought of the night pretty much every day. And anyone with elderly parents or grandparents are perhaps living the same fate as mine. I worried about my mom who just started working again after two months of lockdown. The country is starting to open up again but I feel we are still flying blind. Some nights, I have compete trust in Jesus and I am at a total peace. Some nights, I can’t stop the fear from invading my body. Sometimes, the fear is so great, I feel as if my old panic attacks will return any day. But all of those nights, I am beyond tired after a full day of toddler fun and I drift off to sleep with no problem.

If I just let my thoughts fly, I won’t be here. It could be a good place or a really bad place but it will never be here. And it surprises me every time when I realize how much I am fighting, how hard I am battling to try to stay here, in this moment, in the present. In this moment in time, in this place, in the space where I have most of my loved ones in the same planet. This time with all the possibilities is flowing by right before my eyes.

While I continue to encourage my daughter to keep her dreams alive and real, I now step back. I am contently witnessing everything that is going on around me, in my small world. It is now enough to gaze at the world as the way it comes. I am now brave enough to accept it.

P.S. I have very recently started Instagram. It has been hard to process words lately and I find expressing through my photos is somewhat satisfying!

https://www.instagram.com/saasfee60/