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“You often feel tired, not because you’ve done too much, but because you’ve done too little of what sparks a light in you.” ~  Alexander Den Heijer

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When we do what we love, we feel better.

We feel happier, lighter, and more content.

We can even handle challenges and the everyday tasks we need to do with greater ease. Things feel easier. Life feels better.

Those things that can seem daunting or less appealing feel less “bad” when we’ve done what lights us up from within.

I know that I feel better and happier when I’m doing what I love, when I’m doing what makes me feel inwardly connected, when I’m doing what helps me to feel peaceful and balanced, energized and centered.

And I know that all of life, each moment, feels better when I feel connected and present, when I’m moving with my heart and what feels right to me.

We have responsibilities and practical tasks that we have to do each day, but if we also find time for other things that light us up, we’ll feel better; we’ll feel happier.

This doesn’t have to be in a big or grand or time-consuming way, but we can find even a few minutes each day to do something we love, a few minutes to do something our heart wants or needs.

So many of us have been so conditioned to think we have to be productive or always taking steps toward wherever it is we want to go, but this mentality is exhausting and can leave us feeling depleted.

I think about children a lot in this respect. They don’t think about being productive; they just do what they want. They color or watch something or play outside without any thought that it could mean something negative about them. They don’t think that it’s a waste of time because it’s not productive or won’t “further them” in life.

And while yes, children don’t have the responsibilities that we have as adults (like having to work or pay bills), it’s also true that we still have little kids who live in our hearts—who want to have fun, who want to play, who want to do something they like to do just because they like to do it.

Suddenly when we “grow up,” we think we can only do the things that “we’re good at,” or things that will “get us to where we’re meant to be.” It feels like we’re “wasting time” if we do something just for fun, and we can often feel uncomfortable with not being “productive.”

But it’s impossible to be productive all the time. Our minds need rest; our bodies do too. We can’t always be focusing on the “to-dos” or on “moving productively forward.”

We also need space for rest and fun and play. We need time to do something we love just because we love it. The child in our heart wants to play.

We don’t always have the space or the time to do every little thing we want in the exact way we want to do it, but if we tune inward, we’ll be guided to do what feels right in the moment; we’ll be guided to do what will bring us joy or peace or connection or comfort in the moment.

When we do what we love, when we give ourselves space to be, life will flow a little bit easier. And we might even find that all of the rest of the moments of the day feel a little better too; we may feel more balanced and present and connected through all of our other moments as well.

If we don’t make time for ourselves, for our hearts, to do what our hearts love, to take care of ourselves in the ways that we need, then we’ll likely end up feeling tired, depleted, disconnected, and even bitter or resentful.

Doing this, filling our hearts, may look different every day, or it may look quite the same most of the time. But so long as we’re centered and connected within ourselves, we’ll be able to decide intentionally what feels right, what it is that we truly want or need.

What if we made it a priority each day to do what we love, to do what we can to feel our most balanced, content, and peaceful selves?

What if we let ourselves rest or play when we had the chance?

What if we turned inward, connected with our hearts, and did what felt right to us, if we did what we want and like and need?

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