Tammy Letherer 
I’m at the coffee shop, head down over my laptop, wearing a look of concentration that makes everyone around me think I’m being productive when, in fact, I’m berating myself for my absent-mindedness.
I left the house without my cell phone and had to drive back to get it. It was already an hour past when I meant to leave and I have no idea where that hour went. As I got back in the car for the second time in ten minutes, I looked in the rearview mirror and chided myself.
You sure are spacey.
The glare I gave my reflection also screamed what the heck is wrong with you? Get it together.
It wasn’t simply a brief interlude. I’ve been spaced out all day. I decided recently to increase my meditation time. After comfortably logging twenty minutes a day for years, I like the idea of doubling or even tripling that. I heard a speaker talk about the creative downloads he gets at about forty-five minutes into his meditation. I’d like more creative downloads, I thought. I’ll try it!
The first day, the extra time made me incredibly sleepy and led to the insight that I wasn’t feeling very well, so that wasn’t much fun. Subsequent days have had a combined effect of slowing time down, and while that sounds (and is) a nice change from feeling harried, it’s also made me feel that I have a balloon where my head once was.
If I had to say what it has put me in touch with, the answer would be boredom.
I’m reminded of a time, years ago, when I was finally coming out of the drama of divorcing. Court dates were over, conflicts were resolved, papers were signed. I didn’t know what to do with myself. I had an uncomfortable feeling of nothingness, face to face with a void that looked an awful lot like boredom.
I complained to my friend about it and right after the words “I almost feel bored,” I heard an internal voice say, “What if this is what freedom looks like?”
Hmm.
What if freedom is space? And space is possibility?
And what if spacing out is a natural byproduct of expansion?
When I was a kid, we called people space cadets and it wasn’t a compliment. As the quiet, dreamy type with her head in the clouds, I became an overachiever to prove I wasn’t lazy or stupid. Maybe that’s why I reacted to my spaciness today by berating myself.
Now I think space cadets are cool. They’re rule-breaking, risk-taking, imagination-fueled creatives and pioneers. (Just look at the actual definition of space cadet: someone training to be an astronaut!)
So I’m embracing my spaciness. When I get in the car I’m going to smile at myself in the rearview mirror.
You sure are spacious, I’ll say.
And who knows what will happen next?
