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Beginning Again, Again

September 19, 2016 //
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So many beginnings have followed my April decision to leave the workforce for a while. Today, another; I return to the workforce.

I slept badly. I’m not surprised by it, and I am gentle with myself about this long-term “feature” of my experience. I did manage about 7 hours, split by a brief period of wakefulness after my fitness tracker buzzed my wrist during the night, when my traveling partner alerted me of a change of plans that might see him returning today. That’s pretty exciting, and the news of it kept me wakeful for almost an hour.

I woke pleased to be this person who chooses work clothes ahead of time, and prepares in advance for early morning activities; there is less likelihood I’ll forget something on the way out the door, or feel rushed getting to that point. I dislike feeling rushed, and being rushed by circumstances or people definitely results in forgetting more stuff. I’ll take my time today. I prepared so that I easily could.

I note the time, and realize my mornings are once again compressed between that waking moment, and 7 am; my departure time. Efficiency in these morning moments is once again something that has value. I smile. I’m ready for that, I think, and remind myself to turn on the dishwasher when I leave for the day. I sketched out my new workday routine last night, identifying those household tasks that are the better fit for early morning (quiet, biggest bang for my buck, things I don’t want to come home to…), and those ideal for after work (noisy, quickly handled, most appropriate at the end of the day, things I don’t want to wake up to…). Deep cleaning, big chores, and real manual labor sorts of things shift back to the weekends, when I have the time to take time with them, and also treat myself with care. I guess I’m ready.

First days are generally about beginnings in a lot of little ways. I expect the day to be pretty exciting, generally, with a lot to see, a lot to hear, and a lot to learn. One major new beginning, professionally, is the change from a Microsoft environment to an Apple environment. That’ll be exciting and fun; I remind myself to avoid emotionally investing in outcomes and expectations, and to test assumptions, listen deeply, ask clarifying questions. I remind myself this is not a test, and commit to experiencing the experience, and to be open to new information. The views from my new office are quite amazing, and one question I am eager to ask is whether I can shoot pictures from those windows. 😀

My attention is focused on first day thoughts. My emotions are filled with first day jitters. All that is okay; it’s very human. I breathe. Relax. Check the time, which is most amusing because I’ve got an alarm set at intervals to remind me to move from one thing to the next, I sometimes need that; there’s no need to check the clock. Still… it’s time for breakfast, and next things… and beginning again. Again. 🙂

IMAG8161

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Categories Anxiety, autumn, Brain Injury, Free Will, Healthy Living, Mindfulness, Moments, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, Sleepless Nights, The Art of Being

A Season of Change

September 18, 2016 //
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Tomorrow I go back to work. That isn’t today. Today, however, is a good day to prepare, to make myself ready, to review plans and expectations, to jot down questions, to plot a new commute with care, and plan out new routines that take into account my return to the workforce, as well as the likelihood that I’ll be seeing a great deal more of my traveling partner as the weather turns from festival summer to fireside fall.

The end of a chilly rainy autumn day.

Yesterday ended well, although chilly.

Who am I? It seems a day for such questions. Rainy. Mild. More yellow and amber tones in the leaves of the trees on the far side of the park than there were yesterday. Evidence of time passing, and of seasons changing. I feel transformed, myself, and able to face the prospect of working with quite a bit more contentment, and in much less day-to-day pain, even with the chill of autumn approaching. Has it really meant so much to take this time to care for myself, to live on my own terms, to follow my own agenda? Just six months? Worth it. Totally worth it. I’ll even be taking understandings gained and this perspective on the healing power of leisure into the workplace with me; I’ve learned a lot that has value to long-term workforce management strategies. Am I this person, this analyst-manager, this workforce management professional, this corporate employee? Is this who I am? No. Not really. I am not my work.

I look around the studio, very tidy – even projects in progress are cleaned up, for now, and put neatly aside. I’ll have a guest for some days, soon. Is this who I am? Hostess? Family member, local matriarch, devoted servant of home and hearth? Or am I the artist who has so accommodatingly set everything aside to welcome friends in need, lovers in distress, a traveler returning home, or family visiting from afar? Am I the frustrated citizen, attempting to dot i’s, cross t’s, and jump through hoops of paperwork on fire to comply with some requirement or another? Am I the disabled veteran, committed to my wellness, frustrated by “the system”, still doing what I can to meet my own needs over time, through diet, exercise, and careful management of my health? Am I the woman on the meditation cushion in the window, content, calm, relaxed? (Occasionally distracted with childlike delight to see a squirrel dart past, or a woodpecker stop at the suet feeder, sending both bird and feeder spinning crazily, to my great amusement.)

Who am I? Am I all these – or none? When I cling to some singular potentially defining quality, like my appearance, or an attitude, or a characteristic, or some detail singled out, change becomes such a frightening destructive force, with the potential to rob me of who I am. “Who am I?” is a question that quite honestly used to terrify me – not because I didn’t have a sense of self, but because I didn’t know what “the right answer” was, and that, by itself, was quite terrifying. Follow that with finding myself unclear on precisely what is required to prove the answer. Yep. Terrifying to feel so… unidentified.

There is no “right” answer. There may be quite a few… not “wrong” exactly… “incorrect”? Inaccurate. There may be quite a few inaccurate answers. I take time to consider the difference between “accurate” and “honest”. Truthful fits in there, somewhere, too. I’m not sure that accuracy in the details that describe this being of light wrapped in this fragile vessel made of meat actually answers the question “who am I?” at all well.

It’s a pleasant enough autumn morning, on the edge of a major life change. It seems a good time to give a moment of thought and consideration to the woman in the mirror. It doesn’t have to be fancy, or deep, or complicated; I’ll pick out work clothes for tomorrow at some point later, and likely find myself contemplating the woman in the mirror, who she has become, where she is headed, and how she hopes to share herself in this new context. That’s enough for now. 🙂

A cloudy autumn day suitable for hiking. A good day to walk on; the journey isn't about the destination.

Today begins well, a cloudy autumn day suitable for hiking. The season is changing.

Today is a good day to consider the journey. Today is a good day to walk on. Change is. Perhaps it’s just the season for it? 🙂

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Categories Anxiety, autumn, Brain Injury, Free Will, Healthy Living, Metaphors, Mindfulness, Moments, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, solo hiking, Summer, The Art of Being, The Big 5, Words

When the Rain Comes

September 17, 2016 //
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I woke up later than my idea of early, but while the most of the community is still sleeping on a Saturday. I returned to bed, but failed to return to sleep, and rose to face the sort of heavy gray clouds hanging low overhead that render the phrase ‘overcast’ a joke; this sky means business. The forecast agrees with my impression of the sky, and suggests rain is likely. I’m thinking about the multitude of area farmer’s markets and wondering whether the trip downtown (today) feels worth the time commitment. The nearer farmer’s market is also quite a nice one, having its own character entirely.

I hear the rain begin, a soft tapping on the tall meadow grasses beyond the window. I hear the distant persistent wail of a freight train, so far away it is mixed like a… a good metaphor escapes me; I am listening.

the view of a rainy day

Gray autumn sky overhead, and the day begins.

My thinking seems fuzzy and distracted by the many sounds this morning; geese overhead, raindrops falling more steadily, that train way over there somewhere, the unfortunately rather ceaseless sound of traffic on the nearby road, birdsong, crows conversing, all mixing in my awareness as a sort of blended, endless, buzzing, humming, lowing, rumbling… noise. As noises go, it’s quiet, and very much in the background aside from the crows, whose morning planning meeting on the lawn appears to have run long. 🙂 In this moment, the noise in the background is not an irritant, merely the soundtrack of morning.

rain

Yep. Raining.

It’s definitely raining. The patter of raindrops on leaves is quite audible now. Nice for the garden. I pause and really look out across the meadow, to the trees on the far side of the park, see that the leaves are beginning to turn. Autumn is coming. The leaves of gold and amber, hints of red or orange here and there, tell me it’s true and not just an impression on a chilly morning. I still have the windows and patio door open. It’s too soon for heaters, barely chilly enough for sweaters, and the cool morning breezes with the intoxicating scent of petrichor are delightful. The rain is back! I smile and breathe deeply.

Writing is "inactive" time... so is reading, meditating, and quietly inhaling the scent of a rain morning. There is so much to enjoy in life that requires us to take a moment of stillness. :-)

Writing is “inactive” time… so is reading, meditating, and quietly inhaling the scent of a rain morning. 

It’s been a busy week, filled with stressors that didn’t quite become a bother, and one that did. None of it seems very “real” right now, sitting by the window, contentedly gazing out the window to the meadow and marsh beyond. Any small adjustment in position reveals new things about a new day: a duck sitting just at the edge of my patio, runners on the path just beyond the playground, a cat patrolling the edge of the meadow, a raccoon mother leading her young home after a night out, songbirds taking a moment in a nearby tree, an egret stepping through the marsh gently, and even the ever-changing cloudy sky, as the clouds shift and roil into a smooth homogeneous gray. These are nothing to do with me, directly, they’re only observations through a window. Verbs, changes, choices – but not mine. I am only observing the verbs, changes, and choices of other creatures, which is my choice in this moment, and observation my only verb (trust me, my fitness tracker is pretty firm with me that writing is “inactive” time, which suggests rather pathetically that writing is not a serious verb 😉 lol). I am, however, changed – and changing.

Another perspective on rain drops and roses...

Another perspective on rain drops and roses…

This moment of calm contentment and observation is a practice that I love, and it has proven to be quite powerful. It’s one I want most to be skillfully able to share, this idea of being engaged and present in this moment, right here, observing, aware, awake. It’s a meditation of sorts, I suppose, but perhaps more a state of being? When I meditate, as in seated on a cushion meditating, my observational awareness is directed mostly within, although I am also aware of my environment and surroundings, because otherwise how mindful am I really? This other thing, this “being engaged and present in this moment”, is a little different. My observational awareness is simply awake, aware, present, and engaged in living life. A letting go of over thinking and planning in favor of being and doing describes it some…

raindrops on roses

Is it the difference between saying “stop and smell the roses” and doing it? I think so. Today is a good day to test that theory. 😉

I pause awhile, considering my words, and I am again drawn into the sounds of morning. Where will today take me? Where will I take the day? I sip my coffee and wonder if those are entirely different questions, different ways of asking the same thing, or really not at all different aside from word order. My brain playfully suggests perhaps this is important enough to spend a lot of time on…? I sense an “inner child” eager to distract me with delights, and reluctant to follow through on adulthood this morning. After all – it’s raining! I breathe, and pull my attention back to this moment, here, now. I breathe in the fresh scent of rain. I listen, really listen, to the sounds of it: spattering raindrops, rivulets in rain gutters, tires on wet roadway.

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Today is a good day to be, and to become. Today is a good day for a journey built on choice – and built on change. Today is a good day to be here, now.

…And the rain comes, no mistake. Right now it is a steady downpour. Change is. I sit back and enjoy the rain while it lasts. Impermanence also is, and this moment, here, now, is enough.  🙂

 

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Categories autumn, Free Will, Healthy Living, Metaphors, Mindfulness, Moments, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, The Art of Being, Words

Changing with the Changes

September 13, 2016 //
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Swim or float. Dance or run away. Choose or be swept away by chance, and change. Things do change. It amuses me that one of life’s constants is change, itself.

I woke early, feeling I’d ‘overslept’, but only because I’m resetting my internal clock to wake more precisely at 5 am daily, in preparation for returning to the work force. (Why is it a “work force“, exactly?) Unsure what woke me, I rose, did my ‘oh crap I’m so stiff’ yoga sequence, then made my way toward coffee. I smile, mindful that my routines are at risk of breaking with my traveling partner staying over. It’s on me to manage my self-care, and ensure I stay on track with fitness tasks, and meditation. It is a comfortable awareness where once it felt only frustrating. I keep practicing. So many things are about the experience of a practice, more than any end result, that I’ve gotten much more skilled at not being invested in a particular outcome, which seems also quite comfortable now.

I think I’m saying I recognize I’m fit to return to work, by my own understanding of my self, on my own terms. 🙂 It’s a welcome observation.

My smile rests comfortably on my face; I smile a lot these days, genuine, natural, unforced. It feels good. Smiles feel good; if the facial expression I’m holding in place doesn’t feel good, it’s probably not smiling, however many teeth I may be showing. lol

Change is a real thing, though, and sweeps in as a storm as often as it creeps  in slowly like the tide. Either way, it’s fairly unavoidable. I expected this would be quite a solitary week. It is a week spent in the company of friends, and with my traveling partner. I expected I probably would not see my traveling partner for many days, from last Thursday, to next Tuesday sometime, but here’s he, now, having his morning coffee…and there’s some chance we’ll dine together after I am off work my first day back, next Monday. Not all the changes thrown my way are of consequence, some are quite wonderful and pleasant, some have nothing whatever to do with me, rippling over my experience like the waves of some pebble tossed into still water. Change is, I have no say in that. I’m learning to swim. Learning to dance. Learning to choose to be changed along the way, with a calm heart, and wide-eyed with wonder.

Each time for the first time, each moment the only moment. ~Jon Kabat-Zinn

Each time for the first time, each moment the only moment. ~Jon Kabat-Zinn

It’s a lovely morning on the fading edge of summer. The days grow shorter, and cooler. The nights are becoming longer, and chilly. I begin the days in darkness now, watching the sunrise as I write is far more rare; it hasn’t yet begun, and I am almost finished here, this morning. The wheel turns.

My partner’s voice resonates with warmth and love (or simply because his deeper male voice sounds so to my ears) when he steps into the studio for a word or two. A welcome interruption… I’m nearly finished here, and the day is getting started. There’s a life to live, and a world to explore! There will probably be changes… where I am an ‘agent of chaos’ in my own life, my traveling partner is as often an ‘agent of change’, through his adventurous spirit and spontaneity. Change is. It’s far easier to surrender to the inevitability of change, and to grow, than to resist it – and to grow in some other direction, with considerably less comfort. LOL 😉

IMAG8161

 

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Categories autumn, Brain Injury, Mindfulness, Moments, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, Summer, The Art of Being, Words

The Brain Attacks! Again.

September 9, 2016 //
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It could be that some of my challenges will be part of my experience for as long as I’m experiencing things. It sucks more than a little bit to dwell on that, so I move on with my thinking as quickly as I can, but without cruelty or dismissiveness. I am human, after all. This morning I woke, and quickly found myself reduced to tears…over… nothing. Nothing whatsoever that has any substance in this moment, I mean. Emotions. Dreams? Maybe.

"The Nightmare City" 8" x 10" acrylic on canvas w/glow

“The Nightmare City” 8″ x 10″ acrylic on canvas w/glow

I woke feeling angry with my traveling partner, which is odd; one of my challenges is feeling safe about, and comfortably expressing, anger in my closest relationships. (It’s baggage that isn’t about my traveling partner, but he’s had to endure me lugging it around all this time.) I woke feeling angry that in our first years married, illness held him back from doing a lot of cool things; we stayed home, a lot. Now he’s well, and feeling fully himself, and he lives a busy life of adventure, going, doing, experiencing new things… and we no longer live together, and these are not our shared experiences. The anger I woke with quickly threatened to become a tantrum, a storm of unrelenting strong emotion knocking me off-balance with hurt feelings, and regrets. The anger became grief and sadness as soon as I let myself feel my feelings with compassion, and recognized the simultaneous feelings of resentment, sadness, and insecurity. My heart cried out “what do we have that is ours?” and I couldn’t answer it – not because there is nothing with which to answer, but because I can’t easily find the answer (through tears, through heartache, through the fog of just waking up, before my coffee…) without considerable thought. I let the tears come; it would be a genuinely sad thing to share nothing with one’s lover, and were that the case, there would be no failure in these honest tears.

It's okay to put some of that down, for now.

It’s okay to put some of that down, for now.

Later, I sip my coffee aware of the authentic feelings at the root of my difficult waking moments. I’m deeply in love with this particular human being I call my traveling partner, and at least for now we live very separate lives. Sometimes that is a painful experience. Sometimes it holds some relief that this human being so dear to me doesn’t have to struggle under the weight of my chaos and damage full-time. Right now, in this moment, I just miss him and find myself wondering rather hormonally what value I have… (Fuck you, Menopause, I’m supposed to be past having to deal with hormonal bullshit!) It’s rather foolish. It’s very human.

Love matters most.

Love matters most.

Seasons change. Over the long summer I’ve come to miss him greatly, after enjoying living with him through the winter. I’m eager to enjoy the autumn and winter months together, celebrating holidays, enjoying the company of friends… but… there is something real here that may want my attention, and getting past the tears I’m aware that most his “go” and “do” activities in the past 2 years have developed in other relationships than ours. We spend very little time together; he’s busy elsewhere. (It’s quite possible the time we do spend together fully meets his needs. I’m not sure I’m ready to ask that question…) I woke up hurting over it and wondering what value “we” have for him. It’s not something to stew over – that’s a fast track to misery. I’ll just ask when I see him again, and he will tell me, and then I’ll know. I’ll be back to work soon… there won’t be time for fussing about how little time we spend together, then; there won’t be time left in the days for it. The time we spend together will be limited to the time we have.

My calendar is very full for the next several days. Appointments. Brunch with a friend over the weekend. Friday night with the guys from my previous work team. My last week of leisure will probably be filled with “getting ready to go back to work” activities. It’s not likely that these will be days filled with sadness or passing emotional storms, there’s too much to do, and life to be lived. I feel some regret that my traveling partner wasn’t available to enjoy more of this time away from work with me… but it was time I took for me, as it was, and it has been well-spent on healing, growing, and practicing good self-care. Worthy endeavors, good outcomes. (So, hey, Brain, stop being such a bitch to me, please?)

A gray dawn greeted me so gently I barely noticed it had become day time while I wrote. I’m not crying now, or even sad really. I’m sipping my coffee, listening to music, and feeling a contented smile tug at the corners of my mouth. I think about other friends. Other loves. Other moments of great joy – or great sorrow. Impermanence is a very real thing, and change is, too. I smile thinking about my traveling partner’s good times to come, and his journey here and there. I’m already eager to hear about it – and he hasn’t even departed. lol He’ll take approximately no pictures at all, but my imagination will fill in all the details in the telling. 🙂

Today I don’t opt into loneliness, and once my tears have dried it’s another lovely morning, heading into another day of living a life built mostly on contentment (and bits and pieces of chaos and damage). Today is a good day to begin again. 🙂

 

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Categories Anxiety, art and the artist, autumn, Brain Injury, Free Will, grief, Healthy Living, Logic & Reason, Love, Menopause, Metaphors, Mindfulness, Moments, more than a little bit of bitching, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, Relationships, The Art of Being, Words
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