Slow down.
You move too fast.
Looking for fun and feeling….broody?
Okay that is not exactly how the famed
Simon and Garfunkel song goes.
But do you ever feel broody?
I had never actually heard the term broody
until I became a backyard chicken farmer.
So in the event, you do not know the term either,
here is basically what it means:
A chicken becomes broody when she decides she wants to hatch an egg.
Your once egg-producing happy-go-lucky-hen suddenly gets totally bitchy
and will just sit in the nesting boxes (where eggs are normally laid) all day.
She will squawk and carry on anytime any of the other chickens try to come lay an egg and basically stop all flock production until she can hatch an egg or somehow “snaps out of it”.
This is broody.
And this can last for weeks.
When broody is applied to humans, well it looks kind of similar.
Unhappy. Over-thinking. Non-action. Unmotivated. Stuck.
When I feel broody it can catch me off guard.
What is going on?
How come I am feeling so unmotivated?
What’s wrong with me?
How long is this feeling going to last?
I used to get quite worked up about it.
Like any pattern that repeats itself, there is a gift here when it shows up.
Now, if I feel broody, I recognize it right away and have learned not to panic.
Instead I simply notice it.
I keep an eye on it.
And I check in with ‘it’.
Am I pushing myself too hard?
Am I missing something important that I am barreling through on?
Am I going in the wrong direction?
I simply ask my ‘broody-ness’ what is called for here.
Rest?
Re-set?
Re-direct?
Re-evaluate?
I do not judge it.
In fact, I have learned to accept it just like an inspired or happy mood.
I invite it in for metaphorical tea and ask it what it wants.
I do not expect myself to be inspired, energized, positive or uplifted
every moment of every day.
I allow tired, sad, and broody to be a part of me too.
In the words of an old Persian proverb I remember:
“This too shall pass”.
With all things that show up in my life,
I can resist them or use them to ask myself new questions.
Broody or groovy, it is all part of my human experience.
And yours too.
To simply allowing,
Beth