Noticing A Need for Grace, From Me, For Myself

Well now. Today I had a problem. I kept thinking of what I was noticing. And then I started thinking that it would be like yesterday and the "moment" would present itself to me.

But nothing really presented itself to me!

I did notice I was carrying an annoyed spirit around with me. My annoyed spirit was "riled up" when I had trouble doing some of the poses in yoga at lunchtime, when I kept losing my balance during the standing thigh stretch. I was supposed to watch my inner talk when I fell out of the pose, and not be critical. I was supposed to say, "I fell, let me begin again." I was supposed to extend myself some grace in this "failure". Fortunately my inability to hold the pose for very long did not trigger my inner critic. She is very harsh. Still, I was not altogether happy about having to "begin again!"

This afternoon, a friend was talking about the idea of extending grace to myself (the same grace I extend to others), and the sassy little girl inside me said to me, "No! You're supposed to live in such a way that you don't ever need grace."

The adult inside me said the sassy little girl needed a spanking, not grace. My friend said that even the little girl needs grace.

Extending grace to myself is apparently going to be one of my life-long tasks. 

So today I noticed a new mantra for myself. Simply spoken, it is "I fell, let me begin again." Or, possibly, I failed, let me begin again."