This Grateful Season - Bubble Baths

Tonight, as my blood sugar and mood both sank like a stone, I wiped down the bathroom and rinsed the shower. I filled the tub with hot, fragrant water and sank in quickly, the water turning my skin red. I didn't care. I needed the quiet, the comfort, the solitude of a bubble bath.It used to be impossible for me to take time to take a bath. In my obsessive need to do, do, do how could I ever think that sitting in a basin of hot water was a "good enough" way to spend my time? Especially when I find it to be the most luxuriating experience EVER?Allowing myself to sink into a bath is another positive by-product of therapy. Of being able to do what I "want" and not what I "should". To know that self-care will smooth the wrinkles and massage out the kinks of a bad mood, a bad day. That to let myself relax is the ultimate love.When I'm soaking, the task-master's voice just stops. It's like I'm under water and I can't receive those signals anymore. My brain slows, my head quiets. Sometimes, a quick 20min covers it. Other times I drain out half the lukewarm water and refill it with scalding hot water, rushing over my feet and up my legs, while I reheat and settle back in over and over.Of course I read in the tub, putting my Kindle in a gallon freezer-bag to save it from moisture and the impending doom of my clumsiness. Tonight I started Pema Chodron's "Taking The Leap".She writes:"...when I was on a 3-yr retreat... I would be sitting in my small room looking out at the ocean, with all the time in the world. I would be silently meditating, and this queasy feeling would cover over me; I'd feel that I just had to rush through my session so I could do so something more important. When I experienced that, I realized that for all of us this is a very entrenched habit. The feeling is, quite simply, not wanting to be full present."THAT'S my life in a nutshell, the very thing I am working through. And while I've just begun, awareness is the first step. Awareness, being present and a lot more bubble baths.~ ~ ~**For the month of November, I’m posting something each day that I’m grateful for. It may be as long as an intricate post, as short as a quote, as simple as a link or as wordless as a photograph. A friend has come on board. Join us? #gratefulseason