Archives for category: Post Traumatic Stress
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Don’t Believe The Hype

February 4, 2019 //
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I was a bit nervous about my Traveling Partner making the trip home yesterday. There is an active winter storm warning, and snow in the forecast. Weather forecasting has become, over the years, very accurate.

Here it is this morning. No snow. Just another drizzly morning over coffee. lol The lesson here is clear; do check the weather forecast (or any assumptions), but then also, seriously, seek clarification before becoming fused to some outcome, because, as is so clear this morning, your real-life experience may be quite different than expectations set by someone else may have led you to believe it would be. Where possible, it’s best that our decision-making be tied to reality, and verifiable truths. It’s less confusing that way, and generally less prone to being covered in a snowstorm of inescapable bullshit. lol

…Still… there are snow chains in my car, and emergency gear appropriate to winter weather. So. Yeah. Multiple life lessons on this one. Layers of truth. I’m just saying; it’s not about the advertising. It’s not about the hype. The mystique is irrelevant. The narrative is not the reality.

Fact-check. Act with wisdom, consideration, and great care. Look ahead in life to meeting your needs over time. Living in the midst of plenty right now? How’s your future look? What are you doing about it?

So, I’m sipping my coffee and thinking about the variances between forecasts and actual outcomes, in life, in work, in this moment right here, in the next moment, somewhen out there… It seems a good turning point upon which I can begin again. So many beginnings. Less than 24 hours since my Traveling Partner arrived, and began to settle into life here. Only 8 working days until I leave one job for another. 44 days until the Vernal Equinox. 86 days until my Traveling Partner and I celebrate being married for 8 years. 128 days until I turn 56. In the meantime, there are plenty of small things to consider, to manage, to fit in, to start over, to work around, to celebrate, and to change. It’s a very human life.

It’s enough.

Time to begin again. One day of many. One moment of many. It is indeed enough.

(…I’m pretty glad it isn’t snowing…)

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Categories Allegories, Brain Injury, Free Will, gratitude, Healthy Living, inspiration, Love, Mindfulness, Moments, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, Practices, Relationships, The Art of Being, The Big 5, winter

Breathe. Relax. This is now.

February 3, 2019 //
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Busy weekend. Home making. It’s satisfying work. I am tired and eager to see my Traveling Partner at the end of his long drive. This isn’t a moment that requires any analysis, or any sort of deeper-dive; it’s quite enough exactly as it is.

An earlier moment, almost forgotten in this busy weekend.

I look around satisfied with the day’s progress. I smile in acknowledgement of all the small things that remain yet to be done. The smile is because now I’ll have time. I just got a lot of time back that won’t be spent driving. I gain time in my life back, because I’ll be right here at home – and still get to hang out with this singular human being that I enjoy so much. It’s a brilliantly efficient choice. lol It’s an utterly commonplace choice. These things exist in the same moment of contemplation and joy.

I think about the container garden on the deck. I failed it in every regard, last year, in the ridiculous summer heat, because I was away most weekends, and exhausted most week days. I lost roses that had survived decades of moving with me. It didn’t end up being heart-breaking, which, for me, I realize now was quite an extraordinary bit of progress and healing itself – and I didn’t even notice that at the time. Circumstances were what they were, and I understood them to be a clear consequence of my actions (or lack of), and recognizing my accountability, and understanding what would be needed for a different outcome, I simply let it go at that point. I never noticed the lack of heart-break, the lack of emotional storm. It was what it was, and regrettable, but little more than that. I can, and will, do better this year.

I knock back a cold glass of water. Then another. I pause to appreciate having clean, safe, potable water, right here in the house. I recognize the privilege this presents. Realistically, it isn’t something everyone in the world is so fortunate as to enjoy (and not even reliably right here in the U.S.).

Tonight? Gratitude. Love. Sufficiency. Tomorrow? I begin again. 🙂

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Categories Allegories, Brain Injury, Free Will, gratitude, Healthy Living, Love, Mindfulness, Moments, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, Practices, Relationships, The Art of Being, winter

Ch…ch…ch…ch…Changes

January 31, 2019 //
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Someone else’s powerful poetry serves this moment up to me, this morning. (Thanks, David Bowie.)

Still don’t know what I was waitin’ for
And my time was runnin’ wild
A million dead end streets and
Every time I thought I’d got it made
It seemed the taste was not so sweet
So I turned myself to face me
But I’ve never caught a glimpse
How the others must see the faker
I’m much too fast to take that test

Surfing the waves of joy and anxiety crashing over my consciousness this morning, celebrating change, reveling in agency, and…but… yeah, also having to manage the anxiety that comes with full throttle adulthood in real-time. Scary. Deliciously unpredictable. My sleep is disrupted, and I woke groggy from having too much to dream. I’m already walking that fine line between “enough coffee” and “what the fuck was I thinking having all that coffee?”

Choosing to make a job change (or career change, depending on how those words are defined, but either way, a change of employer) feels a bit strange and disorienting in this moment. It’s “the right move” for me right now, a good choice, based on sound decision-making (from the only perspective I have in this moment, which is… this perspective, now). Still, willfully acting on that perspective, taking full advantage of personal agency, and acting with clarity of purpose in the context of living the life I want to live, that supports my long-term needs and goals, still shakes me up a bit, and causes me considerable anxiety. Maybe it always will. The anxiety isn’t stopping me; this feels right. A good practice; don’t take my emotions as facts upon which decisions must be made.

…It’s still sort of nerve-wracking, now and then. Small stressors loom larger than they need to be. I find myself sort of “holding my own hand” now and then, and seeking out favored colleagues for moments of connection, sharing, and support. Taking time to acknowledge their importance and value to me before I leave really meets some needs, for me, and seems to for them as well. A good practice; connect with people. Authentically. Even, if I dare to use such words in the context of work, tenderly. With care. Consideration. Gratitude. Joy.

It’s a slow sort of celebration. There’ll be a few days between the one and the other, which I definitely need in order to ensure that I leave any baggage and old business behind, before I start on a new adventure. Another good practice; get my head right, let go of baggage.

I’m taking myself seriously – but not taking my bullshit personally. 🙂 Or, at the moment, anyone else’s. It feels pretty nice, overall. Each dawn brings a new beginning… some beginnings are bigger than others. Some are chosen with great care. Some are simply circumstances presenting opportunities. Some are all those things.

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Categories Anxiety, forgiveness, Free Will, gratitude, Healthy Living, Metaphors, Mindfulness, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, Practices, The Art of Being, The Big 5, Uncategorized, winter, Words

Choices, Moments, Steps

January 29, 2019 //
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It is afternoon, sometime. I am tired – so tired. I woke in the night for no obvious reason, and after getting a drink of water to soothe me of nightmares I had already forgotten, and checking my email and finding profound connection, and amazing good news, both, I just couldn’t sleep. My mind would not quiet itself. So… I rested quietly in the darkness, smiling.

I’ll start a new job soon. I’m excited about it. There’s nothing much else to say at present. It appears to be a good choice, made in the right moment, and it is an excellent “next step” toward a future that remains unscripted, and wholly unpredictable. This amuses me, considering that a large part of what I do  professionally gives every appearance of “predicting the future” in some way. lol

I’m tired now. So tired. Too well caffeinated, and I may regret that later… but for now, it sustains my attention on the matters currently at hand.

New beginnings? I see several coming up fast. 🙂

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Categories Brain Injury, Free Will, Healthy Living, inspiration, Moments, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, Practices, winter

There’s a Future Out There, Built on Your Choices

January 28, 2019 //
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Sipping my coffee and thinking about the day and week ahead. Time to get my head out of the studio, and back in the office. Very different scenes. Very different language. It’s a bit of an adjustment. lol

I find myself thinking about “the future” just generally. I think about recent conversations with my Traveling Partner. I think about plans we’ve made to do things together in the year ahead. I think about choices already made, and choices yet to be considered. A substantial portion of “the future” is built on as-yet-unmade choices. The rest? Well, a hash of circumstances, and choices already made, and not yet seen to their conclusions, I suppose. It’s not a static image, like a picture, or a calendar page, though, “the future” – however modest or grand – continuously redevelops, as new choices are made against changes in circumstance. So… yeah.

What are you doing to build the future you want to live in? What are you choosing, in order to get to that place?

It can be frustrating having to accommodate, or adjust for, the circumstantial bits and pieces of a developing future. Same for choices made by other people that result in change for us, ourselves. Nonetheless, it’s part of the puzzle. The most complicated piece of the challenge of “planning for the future”, I think, is about the verbs in the present; our choices right now, our actions right now, our words right now, all become part of what our future is built on. What are you doing about it? I ask, because the literal only piece I directly affect, myself, is the piece built on my own actions, my choices, my words. I’d love to shout back “I’ve got this!”, but I’m not that certain, honestly. 🙂

It is sometimes difficult to hold onto awareness that my choices right now, here, in this moment, directly affect my future. It’s a pretty direct connection, too. I’ll give an example; yesterday I did laundry. I chose to defer the last load (white towels) to “maybe after work tomorrow”, when the hour grew later in the day than I cared to be doing laundry. No problem there. I can do it tonight after work. That was yesterday’s decision-making (made in the present, yesterday). This morning, I hopped out of the shower having forgotten about that decision-making, yesterday… no towel. That’s right. No clean, dry towel waiting for me when I finished my shower. lol Damn it. I was fortunate there was a clean dry towel in the hall bathroom. Still. My decision-making in the present, yesterday, directly affected my (near-term) future. That’s how it works. 😀

The awareness that my decision-making right now affects my experience of some future moment is also a potential anxiety-driver. “Over-thinking” can become indecision and dithering, and all of that just makes the anxiety worse. What the hell?? That hardly seems right… is this some sort of bug in the code, here? Huh. I chuckle and sip my coffee. “Not today, Demons.” I say to myself, contentedly. I breathe. Relax. Let go of my own bullshit – and begin again. New day. New choices. Each choice potentially inching me closer to being the woman I most want to be, living a future life that meets my needs over time. 🙂 Some choices, maybe not so much; my results will vary. lol

 

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Categories Allegories, Brain Injury, Free Will, Healthy Living, inspiration, Metaphors, Mindfulness, Moments, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, Practices, The Art of Being, winter
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