There is a whizz and the sound of pouring water. The smell of coffee beans breaks into my morning routine, welcome and warm. I am rummaging for cream to add to my favorite mug. I am adjusting the lights while my laptop loads, my kids and husband on their way to start their day. I have let the dogs out, and now they are busily munching chewing sticks. It is both noisy and quiet.
I can hear the garbage trucks making their rounds down the street. Stopping and starting. Screech, hiss, rumble. Screech, hiss, rumble.
I am bearing witness to the ordinary. I am savoring the delicious scent of rhythms and morning reflections. I am discerning my day.
I am unlearning hustle culture.
Decades of furious push. Mugs, signs, stickers. One step ahead. Ten more minutes. An additional move. Keep going.
I am stirring my coffee and inhaling deeply.
I have traded cups that quipped about swiping on my lipstick, drying up the tears, putting on my heels and… There is now a mug with a fox. A mug with Christian community. A mug about tears. The word “hustle” is notably absent.
Instead, I appreciate the steam rising from cup. I think about the interruption of taste and smell in my morning. I can feel a small bit of anxiety rushing in as I watch the clock. I can’t be late; I don’t want to disappoint.
I can feel it hunting at my heels, begging me to prove myself. It is that quick. What if they think I’m not pulling my weight? What if I fall behind? What if someone wonders? I force myself to sit. I breathe deeply again.
I would have never considered myself an anxious person. However, there was a hum deep in my soul that drove me with the deliberate intensity of a person who has had to start from the bottom. I could not afford the luxury of an unproductive moment. I did not want to let anyone down. I did not want to waste an opportunity. The margin made for me, paid for by others, felt like a bottomless debt that required unending movement. My soul was exhausted.
I thought about this on the day we put our remodeled kitchen back together. My body felt withdrawn, and the to-do list had no end. I looked at the mug in my hand, “Put on your lipstick and hustle,” and I walked to the trash. This was it.
Mugs, cups, stickers. I swept through the house and gathered all the reminders. I could let go.
Every day it got easier. The moments turned into days, then weeks, and new rhythms.
It is a hard-earned freedom. Some days I have to fight harder, but I have more days of steady walking than frenetic rushing. I stand at the window. I find joyful tasks for my hands. It has been a beautiful detox. I am finding the ordinary beautiful, and it is so good.
Eliza Cortes Bast is a fierce and honest follower of Jesus. She is a pastor and denominational executive, dedicated to helping churches think missionally. She lives into her passion by connecting people, advocating for the community, and helping organizations think strategically so they can be healthy, vibrant, and sustainable. Eliza lives in Michigan with her patient and handsome husband EJ, and their two boys. Her loves include her home country Puerto Rico, her interracial marriage, a good steak, salsa dancing, writing, empowering emerging leaders, making the impossible possible, Diet Coke, and mentoring. She is not a big fan of anger without action, generalizations, basketball, and saying you can’t live without coffee. She believes you can because she believes in you.
Beautiful, precious moment when you throw the mug in the trash!