What would be healthy is to see this being signed off work as a good thing. To turn toward the opportunity I have been provided.
In a mindfulness session the person guiding the practice is likely to say something along the lines of “If you notice your mind has wandered then, without any judgement or self criticism, let go of the distraction and return the mind to where you had intended it to be.” There is no discrimination as to the distraction; whether a future fantasy or a raking over of a negative event in the past, where the mind is attending is not important. It is noticing the mind’s dispersal that is the practice.
Similarly, at this time of frustration and guilt at being at home and not at work, I would like to gently and slowly let go of those thoughts and emotions and return to what is actually here – not to get lost and inattentive in my own projections of how things are now and how they might be in the future. Instead seeing this circumstance as it is; not moving my mind enthusiastically toward it, nor be pushing it away. It doesn’t matter if the path is a pretty country lane or a foreboding concrete underpass; this is how it is.
