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Love and Lovers

January 16, 2018 //
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There’s more to say on such a big topic. A paragraph or two about love and lovers isn’t going to cover the subject thoroughly at all. I won’t try. It’s early in the morning, and I’m headed to work soon. The morning is rainy. The coffee is hot. My mood is merry. Easy stuff on a Tuesday.

The view from my weekend away.

I scroll through my Facebook feed, catching up after a weekend away. I flip through the posts – what’s with all the angst-y relationship drama? (More than enough over the weekend, as well – seasonal?) I don’t laugh – it really isn’t a cause for amusement or celebration when lovers suffer in each others arms, most particularly consider the great care some lovers take in crafting their shared misery. The choices! The effort! The lovingly hand-crafted artisanal misery! It’s amazing to me that even if pointed out such that awareness is unavoidable, a great many people will still “well, she…”, “well, he…”, with real ferocity to return to an acceptable understanding that allows them to rationalize not making any changes at all. It’s weird. It’s as if – wait for it – they are actually choosing to be unhappy together instead of choosing to be actually happy, or at least content and blissful. So strange. It’s hard to watch. It’s always been hard to watch. It makes my acid reflux flare up to have to watch it. It makes me heartsick to have to turn away. (I can’t fix it!) 😦

Love isn’t misery. If you are miserable, I assure you, it isn’t the love causing that. It’s the bullshit. 😉 Drop the bullshit. lol (Sounds so easy in those terms, but yeah – there are still a lot of verbs involved, and you can’t avoid those, or pay for someone else to do them.)

I’ve had cause to be soaked in drama recently. Not so much a choice as a test of endurance, loving kindness, compassion, and the experience and (limited) wisdom that come of age – and that come of fucking up several potentially wonderfully promising relationships myself over the years. Doesn’t make it easier to bear witness to the misery of lovers who refuse to see that they are choosing their misery for themselves, with great care, and putting every ounce of their being into tending and maintaining it. Yikes. I can’t even imagine the power and joy of a relationship into which similar effort and energy are put directly into actually loving each other!

Sharing the love, and sharing the building. Destruction is far less joyful.

…Oh. Wait. Yes, yes I can actually imagine the power and joy of a relationship into which lovers are putting the full weight of their effort and energy directly into actually loving each other! I have that! How wonderful! 😀 I worked – and work – with great care to build (instead of destroying) to support and nurture (instead of criticizing and tearing my partner down) to attend to my own chaos and damage (because we really only have the power to change our own ways, to deal with our own issues, to put down our own baggage), and to learn to love well.

A gray, black, and tan moth is colorful up close. Perspective matters. 🙂

I’m still learning. I practice every day. I make mistakes. I make amends. I screw up. I make it right. Again and again. I learn something new that works. I practice it often. I find out something I do is problematic. I look at ways I could change my approach for a better result. I face the awareness that something my lover does is uncomfortable for me. I learn to bring those issues to the table with kindness, patience, and understanding that I am having my own experience, and “demanding change” is not always the most effective (or efficient) way to achieve the result I want. I learned to assume positive intent, and learned to share my words gently, and to listen deeply. I learned to let go of assumptions and expectations, and to distinguish between acceptance and being a doormat. lol So many life lessons to love well! We have to learn each of them on our own. The verbs pile up.

I may be writing about love for the rest of my life – there is that much to say about it, and I’m no expert. 🙂 Love matters most. Love inspires. Love pulls us. Pushes us. Changes us. Love is powerful stuff. I spent the weekend wrapped in love. Home now to begin a new work week, I’m still thinking about love – and lovers.

There is always time for love. (Make time for it.) What could be a more worthy use of your precious limited mortal life than to love?

Speaking of time… it’s time to begin the work day. 🙂 One new beginning among so many. It’s time to begin again. 🙂

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Categories Free Will, Frustration, grief, Healthy Living, loneliness, Love, Metaphors, Mindfulness, Moments, pain, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, Relationships, The Big 5, winter

All Things Considered

January 12, 2018 //
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I am taking a few minutes to relax and consider things. Consider the week that has just ended. Consider the weekend just about to begin. Consider this moment right here, and moments past that were entirely different. I am taking time to consider writing in the morning, versus writing in the evening, and which really works best for me – and I am considering whether there is any need for so much structure around what is (for me) such a natural thing? I am considering the contents of my pantry, which are depleted, and my fridge, which is almost empty; I’ve been sick, and there’s been no shopping done in more than a week. More than two.

I am distracted from my considerations by the smile on my face; I adult well enough to manage life without having to grocery shop for nearly two weeks. Nice. 🙂 (To be fair, though, that’s mostly true because I’ve spent the last week sick, and disinclined toward much besides broth or soup or coffee or tea, and certainly I’m almost always well-stocked on all of those. lol)

Today at work I had two relatively special personal moments of… some kind. I’m not sure what to call either. I reached a point of feeling the crushing workload as, indeed, crushing – overwhelming, distracting, complex, unsatisfying, and even frightening; this was driving a lot of anxiety and I started to have a panic attack – in the office. Fuck. Fuckfuckfuckfuckfuckfuckityfuck. Shit. Damn it. Okay okay – I managed a deep breath. I managed another. I managed to admit to myself that I hadn’t been practicing good self-care, and if nothing else, I really needed a break. No. Not a walking meeting. A break. No, no, not a moment to help someone else with another task. Stop that. A break. No. Damn it. Not an opportunity to vent about these frustrations (that are so transitory). A proper break, away from the work, just – a break.

So I took one.

I got up from my desk, moved to a more comfortable seat in a spot without any connectivity or active devices within reach. No one to talk to, with, or at. No issues. No questions. I took the 10 minutes I really needed. With me. No judgment. No criticism. Just a few moments of meditation, smack in the middle of the work day. It felt sooooooo good. When those few delicious quiet moments concluded, I wasn’t feeling panicked or anxious or unprepared or inadequate or even over-taxed. I was ready to work.

So I worked.

One of the things I went back to work with was a calm settled appreciation for the great team I work with. We support each other. There’s a lot of authenticity and caring. It was a crazy busy week – and it was good. I stopped working a couple times later, throughout the day, simply to briefly thank the colleagues who have helped so much. We count on each other. We can. It’s that kind of place, and I couldn’t help contrasting that with, of all things, the current federal administration. I felt a moment of poignant sorrow and understanding; can you imagine what working in that fog of hate, confusion, and chaos must be like for rational beings who mean well and want to serve America in a positive way? That would definitely be a job to leave. I find myself stalled for just a moment considering all those folks feeling trapped in jobs they very much want to leave.

I went home feeling profoundly grateful for the life I am living right now. That felt pretty good, even if I did arrive home in pain. Just arthritis, right? We age. We deal with pain – as it turns out feeling our bodies age isn’t especially comfortable. lol

Tonight it’s a gentle night of self-care. I need that. It’s also a night of packing, tidying up, and readying myself for another trip down to see my Traveling Partner (who’s the traveler now!? lol) – I miss him greatly and find myself eager, in spite of also feeling soooo fucking tired. I look forward to getting over that. In the mean time, I’ll make a list tonight, and tomorrow I’ll begin again. 🙂

 

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Categories Anxiety, Brain Injury, Free Will, Frustration, health, Healthy Living, Logic & Reason, loneliness, Love, Metaphors, Mindfulness, Moments, more than a little bit of bitching, pain, Parables, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, Relationships, The Art of Being, War and News of War, winter

Small Things Matter

January 7, 2018 //
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All weekend it’s been a matter of choices – choices to care for myself, or choices that were less about that and more about getting some specific task handled. No surprise – these concepts come into conflict regularly. I have managed to choose self-care more often than other things, mostly, and I feel as if, mostly, I am sort of mostly getting over this once-a-sore-throat-now-something-more-about-a-nasty-hacking-cough-and-shortness-of-breath. I face choices again. Do I commit to getting my ass up early tomorrow and dragging myself into the office choking on my own snot, or do I properly care for myself as an adult, aware that I could be contagious, and ew gross – pretty sure no one wants to listen to me coughing all day – and make the choice to call out? I’ve been thinking it over for a while.

I finally have to come to terms with one of adulthood’s mighty challenges; I have responsibilities I am not able to delegate, so… either I say “fuck it, you’ll all get by, see you Tuesday, folks”, or… work from home. Okay. I’m right in that sickness median between too sick to care (and therefore easily able to just call out) and getting well enough to go in (in which case, capable of some work)… I’m fortunate that I have the option to work from home, and I go ahead and make that choice. It feels good to take care of myself. I pause for a moment of compassion, regret, and even anger that there are hard-working people out there, everywhere, who literally can not afford to call out from work, however sick they may be. That’s just not right.

Working in the environment I do, I am very aware of the business consequences over time of productive hours lost to contagion in a confined area. I see it every year. I see well-meaning folks attempting to make the “right” choice coming in to work when they are likely to be contagious, because they don’t want to, or can’t financially afford to, miss work, and getting everyone they talk to exposed, everyone who touches a surface they touched exposed, everyone who passes through air space into which they sneezed or coughed exposed – and a goodly percentage, in a short time, will themselves either call out, or work at reduced productivity while infecting colleagues. I try to be very mindful myself that contagion lasts longer than we realize, often beginning before we know we’re ill, and lasting some time after we feel “mostly over it”. Working from home tomorrow is a good choice… it still took me hours to make that choice and feel confident I am doing the right thing – which is hilarious. I still have to work so hard at taking care of me. It’s worth practicing, though. 🙂

This weekend has been all naps and chicken broth, rest and self-care, good nutrition, and attending to my  health. Being sick leaves me exhausted and anhedonic, lacking in appetite, soaked in ennui. I know it will pass. I have done little and still feel wrung out and overworked. I’ll get over it. I keep drinking water, tea, broth… trying to drown the virus or steam it out. lol I simultaneously feel grateful to live alone (no cranky interactions), but also deeply lonely (to be cared for like a child home sick from school). I am exhausted, and also bored. I am restless, but so tired I’d rather nap than do anything at all. It sucks and I will be glad to be done with it. lol Maybe I’ll be over it tomorrow? Well… if nothing else, tomorrow I can begin again. 🙂

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Categories anhedonia, Brain Injury, Free Will, Frustration, health, Healthy Living, loneliness, Metaphors, Mindfulness, Moments, more than a little bit of bitching, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, Relationships, solo hiking, The Art of Being, The Big 5, winter

1458 Posts, Still Practicing

January 5, 2018 //
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I am not perfect. Not even close. Hell, I’m still practicing the most basic practices, generally, as a beginner. A student. An amateur. A novice. I even try to practice very much as if I’d never done it before – with my full attention, with care, aware of the moment and the motions, deliberately, and with my whole will – and 1458 published blog posts later, I’m still practicing. Like… practicing. Because I have not yet achieved mastery – and maybe can’t or won’t, I don’t know that, and it isn’t relevant to day-to-day practicing of practices. What matters is the practice itself, and the effect it has on my experience to do so. 🙂

I’m a bit woozy and light-headed from the over-the-counter remedies I’ve taken to ease the symptoms of the ick-of-the-month going around the office (or maybe I picked it up at the party? No matter, that’s not important). I’m in a much better mood than yesterday, which I rather expected; really shitty moods are not especially sustainable. I took steps to take a step back, and ended the evening quite pleasantly.

I woke during the night with the sore throat. I figured maybe I was breathing through my mouth… but no, I woke with it in the morning, somewhat worse. I didn’t think much of it, it was only a tickle. By noon, it was a distraction, by 2 pm I actually felt unwell. On my way home, with a frown, and recognition that strep throat, specifically, should not be brought into the office, I pulled into the wee urgent care clinic I favor and got the diagnostic test for strep done, and had the doctor take a look. It’s not strep. I’m glad about that… well… I was initially very glad. At this point, I just feel mostly pretty shitty and ill, and I don’t really care about it – or much of anything else. I ache all over. My head hurts. My throat hurts. The tickle is becoming a nagging, dry, hacking little cough, also very annoying. I guess I know what I’m doing this weekend. Maybe I’ll also slowly get all the holiday decor put away… but I won’t be hard on myself if I don’t. I think I could already go to bed… and it’s not yet 5:30 pm. lol

Dinner was a lovely rich Pho that I picked up on my way home. I already didn’t feel much like eating, or at all like cooking, but I knew I would need to take care of myself, too. I’m annoyed that I’m sick, but the annoyance doesn’t help anything, so I let it go. In fact, I let it go every time it comes up (again). It still comes up, of course; I’m human. I remind myself that “we’ve got to pay for our thrills”, and that breaking all my routines for a high energy holiday celebration with a horde of rambunctious friends merrily cavorting through the days and nights was sure to hit my immune system at some point, and I knew that going into it. It did. No surprise there; I specifically and willfully chose to enjoy the weekend as I did – so, also, no fair bitching about the cost. Now it’s time to pay the check, that’s all. If I deal with a sore throat for a few days, I get off pretty easy, I think. 😀

Damn I’m tired. Tired. Woozy. Feeling crappy. It’s time to put all this aside and take care of me in the real life, not just talk about it. lol Tomorrow I can begin again. 🙂

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Categories anhedonia, Brain Injury, Free Will, Frustration, health, Healthy Living, Metaphors, Mindfulness, Moments, more than a little bit of bitching, pain, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, Relationships, The Art of Being, The Big 5, winter, Words

Making Room for Baggage

January 4, 2018 //
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I am in a fairly crappy mood this evening. No particular obvious reason stands out. Nothing really seems to be wrong. The work day wasn’t bad. The commute wasn’t bad. Just my mood. The headache isn’t helping, but I’ve taken something for it, had a big glass of water, and made a healthy evening meal of left over acorn squash stuffed with kale and quinoa. Pretty yummy. I’m okay. The house is secure and warm and quiet… so… what’s this bullshit about? That’s not really a rhetorical question – and I do know the answer. Perhaps you’ve heard the old adage “you’ve gotta pay for your thrills”?

I’m managing a smile in spite of my crappy mood, and feeling sort of… accomplished? I broke all my routines celebrating the new year with friends and loved ones. Late nights hanging out, listening to music, celebrating or grieving change, all of us together, enjoying irregular meals that didn’t conform well to specific dietary needs (sugar!!!!) – and all the over stimulation a great house party can provide have finally taken a real toll. I’m not just tired. I’ve gotten some good rest, and my sleep cycle already seems pretty well restored to the usual sleeping/waking timing, so no, it isn’t that – or, that’s only part of it. It was a damned good time, and I’m finding it hard to “come back to real life”, in the sense that merry-makers making merry don’t find much cause to have to “manage their time” – and I was really enjoying that. lol Now it’s back to planning, managing, and dealing with a steady grind that – however pleasant – is not built on my agenda, and over which I have very limited power to influence the course of events, or decision-making. Honestly, I’m just an analyst. A cog. A worker. A human being converting precious limited life-force into cash money for later use elsewhere.

Sure, beautiful…but… it isn’t “home”.

I sigh aloud in the empty still room. This too shall pass. I’m feeling a bit moody, but not particularly broken; this seems a positive change. I’m not angrily protesting the status quo, or furiously ranting about the unfairness of it all (the status quo kinda sucks, for a lot of people, and worse than for me – and frankly, we’re all pretty fucking familiar with unfairness, too). I’m calm and quiet, just sort of irritable – and I guess I’m even okay with that, sitting here quietly, after a nutritious meal, thinking of “home” – is it? Out there in the quiet countryside… among friends… out in the trees… Is it “home”? It could be. God damn it, I very much want it to be.

More than a beautiful view. A life.

…What if I don’t live that long?

Okay, that goes too far, Brain – what’s with the vicious attack in the middle of a quiet evening? I catch myself tearing at my cuticles. So human. Shit. My mood wobbles toward frustration, fear, despair. I’m still okay right now. There is nothing going in this immediate moment that puts me at any greater risk of imminent death than I’m in at any other moment. We will all die at some point, and it is the rare circumstance when the end comes at a planned time. I sneer angrily at the lame attack on my emotional balance by my irritable brain. I seethe over my own bullshit. I’m not having it tonight. Another sigh punctuates the quiet, and I switch up my approach; I decide to “be here” for me – because I am literally the only person here right now. lol Maybe I can cut myself some slack? I really did throw self-care into the waste bin for 4 days, in the sense that my effort was half-assed at best (it’s still a lot of ass, just less than usual). 🙂

I take a minute, remind myself “this too shall pass”, and think back on other disruptions to routines, other trips away with challenging emotional outcomes. That trip to Vegas? The meltdown after that must be legendary – I haven’t had to face anything like that, this time. I’m just a little moody – and not even a lot. Just headache-y, a bit irritable – and still totally okay right now. I smile, noticing how heavily I am reinforcing that awareness. Practices take practice.

Sometimes it isn’t even obvious if there’s a path to be on.

One step at a time, we each walk our own hard mile. Tomorrow, I’ll begin again.

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Categories anger, Anxiety, Brain Injury, Free Will, Frustration, grief, Healthy Living, Logic & Reason, loneliness, Love, Metaphors, Mindfulness, Moments, more than a little bit of bitching, pain, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, Relationships, The Art of Being, The Big 5, winter, Words
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