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Changing a Mood is So Easy!

November 29, 2016 //
0

I got off work yesterday in a good mood, tired, enthusiastic about the walk through town and over the bridge at twilight, and looking forward to a quiet evening at home. The commute wasn’t merely uneventful, it was also a miracle of coincidence and great timing. I arrived home, still smiling.

Some enchanted evening...

Some enchanted evening…

What follows is a cautionary tale about emotional health.

As I waited for dinner to cook, not wanting to wander off or be distracted, I picked up my phone, and opened my news feed. I noticed there seem to a be lot of articles about hate, hate crimes, and the general mistreatment of human beings toward one another. I dove right in and read one, then another, and another… over minutes, I read several. I was also cooking, and pretty focused on that. As minutes passed, I found myself no longer smiling. Feeling somewhat discontent. Generally a bit aggravated. A few minutes further on, I was feeling annoyed. Irritable actually. I sat down with dinner, finding fault with small things that typically don’t bother me at all. (Damn, are the guys next door going to be so noisy all evening? Seriously? Is that a leaf on the floor from where I came in, earlier??)

I ate my dinner in a mood of aggravation and discontent. It seemed a mysterious change, and it was some minutes before I connected my roiling stew of negative emotions looking for a fight with reading the news some time earlier. Then I did make the connection. I put down my device. I tidied up the dinner dishes feeling a bit thoughtful and pre-occupied. Had I really made a point of willfully turning a lovely mood sour by my own hand? What was I thinking? I sigh, recognizing the temptation of turning my negative emotions on myself, rather than helping myself into a better emotional place with at least the same effort I brought to wrecking the pleasant mood I was in, in the first place; it’s easier to be hard on myself than it is to change.

I gave the news a rest, and renewed my commitment to not treating myself so badly in the first place. News retailers are in business, and business is focused on profit, and what is profitable is holding consumer attention, and what holds consumer attention is… outrage. Yep. We gobble up news about hate, about fear, about the outrageous and “what is wrong with the world” – and then wonder why we’re angry, outraged, or frightened. We’re some fancy fucking primates – not all that smart about some things, but damn, we’re fancy. We write news, put it in front of other primates, sell what we can – and write more of that. Think about that for a minute – if the point is sales, and profitability, and what sells are the stories about hate, doesn’t it seem quite obvious that more stories about hate will be written? I’m not saying that the world isn’t full up on hate these days, but I am saying that whether or not it were, if stories about hate are what sells the most views, clicks, and subscriptions, then aren’t there going to be just a whole bunch more stories about hate? To read. To be consumed. To set an impression of the world we live in, generally?

I put myself in a gentle time out and spent much of the evening meditating. It was a significant improvement over reading the news. I ended the evening feeling soothed and balanced. Hate in the world is not eased or relieved by fear, or anger, or more hate. Awareness that hate in the world is an issue is something to cultivate, but succumbing to it myself is to be avoided. That seems practical and obvious (to me). I don’t need to read even one more article about some human being treating another badly “because Trump” – I am aware that human beings mistreating each other is a problem. It was a problem before the election, and it will likely continue to be a problem after the next four years is behind us; some people choose some really vile verbs. Hate exists. Fear exists. Anger exists. People having those experiences are probably having them in fashion that seems justified, reasonable, or even appropriate to them in the moment. There are some hateful things going on. There are some scary circumstances (and scarier people) in the world. There are good reasons to be angry, and things worthy of being angry about.  It remains a worthy endeavor to treat people well, nonetheless – including the person in the mirror.

This morning I woke to the alarm. A new day. A chance to begin again. I don’t start with the news. I renew my commitment to myself to choose what I read with great care. Sensational headlines get my attention; that’s why they work, that’s why they are written that way. It’s generally enough to read the headline, sass it silently, and move on. Advertising and color commentary masquerading as actual news can be distracting – and emotive. I remind myself to avoid it. Hell, at some point, continuing to read and reread the same tired bullet points spread across media outlets, being used to stoke new outrage and keep reader engagement high, actually takes time away from taking action on causes that matter… in some cases, the very causes that are so engaging to read about. (How many news stories have you read about DAPL? Have you taken a leave from work to get out there and help? Donated money? Written letters to congress? Any verbs at all – or just reading along? How about the lead in the drinking water in Flint, Michigan? Local homelessness? Foreign wars? Just saying; there’s plenty in the world that could use some well-chosen verbs.)

I’ll point out that all the same choices and practices that soured my mood could be made more selectively, more skillfully, and used to build a great mood from a bad one: intellectual distraction, investment in a specific emotion by choosing experiences that tend to reinforce and enhance it, repetition, and mindfully engaging that emotional experience deeply.

Today is a good day to put down the news, set aside the outrage machinery, and choose some verbs. If the point of life is to live it… why would I be spending my precious limited lifetime reading the news, anyway? 😉

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Categories Anxiety, Brain Injury, Free Will, Healthy Living, Logic & Reason, Metaphors, Mindfulness, Moments, Parables, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, The Art of Being, War and News of War, winter, Words

Beginnings and Ends

November 28, 2016 //
0

My coffee is still too hot to drink. The alarm clock seemed very loud when it woke me. I feel a bit as if I am moving especially slowly this morning; the clock corrects my very subjective perception of time. It’s a Monday after a long weekend. As if on cue, my brain launches a salvo of small anxiety-provoking attacks about this or that detail at work; I quash them with a minute or two of mindfulness, breathing deeply, present in this moment here. Work can at least wait until I actually get to the office! 🙂

Summer is definitely over. Autumn nearly over, too. Thanksgiving is done. The holiday season – my idea of holiday season, I mean – has begun. It is a beginning I wait for, plan for, and cherish each year. I have my own traditions, built on my values, refined over an adult lifetime, added to by one partnership, then another, over the years. The specifics are less meaningful or shareworthy, I think, than that I do have my own, chosen with care, selected from the celebratory traditions of my childhood, and then made my own, quite willfully. I like the way I do the holidays. It is rare for me to be overcome by ennui or despair during (or over, or about) the holidays, and I’ve tended to attribute that to doing them my own way… though, I don’t have any cite-able proof of that; it is my subject experience, only. For me, that’s enough, at least on the topic of holidays. 🙂

As days go, today doesn’t stand out in any obvious way. The beginning of a new work week. The beginning of the holiday season. I like beginnings, although they usually follow endings, which I often tend to think I dislike (compared to beginnings), but again, I have no clear evidence of that impression, and find myself wondering if the words truly reflect my thinking, or only some moment in my thinking that will quickly dissipate when my attention turns to other things? Change is. Whether an ending, a beginning, or some transitional point on a spectrum between those moments, change is part of the scenery on life’s journey.

I think of my Traveling Partner and smile. We have different approaches to living life in the moment; I prefer to plan, and to maintain a high level of readiness for many likely outcomes, and to cultivate a benevolent tolerance of circumstances that fall outside my planning, with frequent “rest breaks” from the hectic pace of life when I can retreat to a quiet corner of the world to take it all in, before returning to the busy-ness of life’s default settings. He has the boldness required to freely take life utterly as it comes, seemingly fearlessly and without anxiety; embracing change with a spontaneity that awes me, and often leaves me feeling unsettled.  We handle our emotional lives quite differently, too, both very human, both capable of great depths of emotion, both embracing intimacy and connection, and yet such different people day-to-day, in spite of shared values, shared experiences, and sharing (to this day) our journey in life over years. He finds too much planning constricting, and expresses feeling pressured. I find too little planning chaotic, and feel… pressured. lol We are more similar than we are different. This is likely true of each and all of us; more similar than different. Any human being’s most basic needs are likely to be pretty much the same from one person to the next. So many arguments between human beings are about meeting the same basic need in different ways, informed by prejudices, filtered through individual experience, limited by individual perspective, and individual understandings of definitions of terms. We’re still more similar than we are different – right down to not listening very well when another one of what we are is talking to us about their own experience. 😉

Taking time for simple pleasures matters, too.

Taking time for simple pleasures matters.

My coffee is not so hot now. I drink it down and consider a second one… there is time for that. I look across the table, the holiday tablecloth, placemats, and centerpiece are happy reminders of the weekend spent immersed in a wonderland of holiday memories, colorful trinkets, and tiny lights. The entire room is transformed. The tree stands in the far corner, and canisters of freshly baked cookies beyond that, on the bookshelf in that corner. Everywhere some Yule detail catches my eye. I smile. The soft glow of the room feels like it sources from within me. Sure, I’ll have a second coffee. Today is a good day to take time to enjoy simple pleasures. I’ll go do that. 🙂

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Categories Anxiety, autumn, Brain Injury, Free Will, Healthy Living, Love, Metaphors, Mindfulness, Moments, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, Relationships, The Art of Being, women, Words

More Today Than Yesterday

November 27, 2016 //
0

I woke too early this morning, and by “too early” I mean that I definitely wanted to sleep later, certainly had the time for sleeping later, and just could not convince my brain that sleeping later was the thing to do this morning. I finally got up at 5 am, after tossing and turning, meditating, fussing, and daydreaming for about two hours. I feel well-rested, I just didn’t “feel like” getting up so early. I’m definitely awake, though.

Yesterday was spent quietly; easily achieved without having the temptation of television lurking nearby all the time. I don’t miss the TV. I’m getting by, computer-wise, on my work laptop, although it is not truly a substitute. I can at least write, much more easily than if I had to use my phone each morning. I’m content with things as they are. I have what I need, and that’s enough.

Yule is on my mind this weekend, as I set up the holiday tree, and decorate the house for the holiday season. Each year when I open the box of ornaments, it is as if I am holding precious memories in my hands. I decorate the tree, and remember things. Each ornament is a story, from a place and time before now. Each year I add one or two more ornaments, significant in some way, and they add to this strange memory box that only gets opened once a year – but always does get opened, yearly. Each year I consider who I am in the context of a lifetime. Each year I emotionally gorge on an intense assortment of recollections, until, by New Year’s Day, it is both timely and necessary that it all be put away for another year. Each year I hold in my hands small fragile reminders of good times and bad, of past versions of the woman in the mirror, of old pain, old sorrow, old joy, and old delight.

When I was much younger, the ornaments were selected with less care, more randomly, more about “ooh, shiny!” sorts of moments and impulses, and much less about what story they could tell, later. In recent years, new ornaments have been selected with great care, and the ornaments themselves become part of the story of who I am, told (mostly) in glass… and glitter, sequins, ceramic, paper, and twinkly lights. There is a gap in these memories (my own memories as well, it’s just placed differently in time); when my first marriage ended, I took only my “personal effects”, and my artwork, leaving everything else behind – including 13 years of Yule celebrations, 6 of those in Germany (the lovely ornaments purchased at the Augsburg Christkindlesmarkt we visited each year – all gone).  In their place, the worn cardboard box of small glass ornaments, 18 balls in assorted colors, that were the first ornaments I bought (at the local discount store next to the apartment complex I moved into) to begin rebuilding Yule after my marriage ended (they’re now more than 20 years old). I had visited my Granny that year over the holidays. In a wily Machiavellian act of master manipulation, she engineered a reconciliation between my parents and I, ending an estrangement that had lasted longer than my first marriage had, itself. I returned home with ornaments from childhood, a gift from my mother. She later sent me others. They remind me of childhood Yule celebrations, and more subtle things.

I’ll finish the weekend by finishing the decorating, savoring the moments revealed one by one as I hang the ornaments on the tree. Finally getting to the ornaments I made in that last holiday before I chose to live alone; it was a peculiarly awkward, sometimes rather grim holiday, that year. I celebrated mostly alone, in a shared household. The ornaments I made are lasting reminders that love can’t be forced or negotiated with, and once lost it is gone. They also remind me how much of my experience is chosen, and that even in the difficult moments in life, happy memories can be made, cherished, savored – and can become the lasting recollection of a trying time in life. I’m still working on that; there are verbs involved. 🙂

I sip my coffee and look across the dining table, still covered with ornament boxes of a variety of sizes. I’m only half-finished. It’s a time-consuming process for me to set up the tree alone; I pause for memories rather a lot. Some years I cry rivers of tears, too. This year hasn’t been that way; I celebrate with a quiet joy, and reflect more on what is, than on what isn’t. It’s not a process I rush. I have time – all weekend. Hell, I have a lifetime to unpack what memories I have, to cherish them, to savor them, to return them to their tidy boxes when the moment is done. Time enough to ask myself “why is this one significant?”, and “still?”, and “even now?”, and remind myself it is okay to set down some baggage this year (every year) and go forward a bit more the woman I most want to be.

The story of life's climate, and the emotional weather are told in so many ways; memories, however real they seem, are not moments. :-)

Memories and moments, today will be filled with both. 🙂

Today is a good day for a cup of coffee and a handful of memories. I smile and think of my Traveling Partner, and the memories we have made together, and this strange wonderful somewhat unconventional choice to be both quite partnered and quite solitary. I sip my coffee contentedly. Isn’t contentment enough? Ah, but what about changing the world? Let’s not forget to do that, too. 🙂 I get up to make a second coffee… as with most things, including changing the world, there are verbs involved. 😉

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Categories Brain Injury, Free Will, Love, Metaphors, Mindfulness, Moments, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, Relationships, The Art of Being, winter, Words

Language Functions by Agreement

November 24, 2016 //
2

It’s a true thing; language functions by agreement. We understand each other because we believe we share definitions of terms. It’s often true that we do (more or less, individual subtleties and variations notwithstanding). Language also fails to function – by agreement; we often implicitly agree that in order to “keep peace”, to avoid “starting shit”, to evade “drama”, we overlook failures to explicitly clarify our meaning, even though we’ve seen that we are not communicating with clarity.  Well, damn, people, don’t do that. Just saying.

My idea of a beautiful Thanksgiving holiday and yours may differ – it’s generally not the sort of difference that causes terrible heartache, unless someone defies some commonly held familial, tribal, or community tradition based on novel (or merely outside the group) thinking. What about words like “equal”, “truth”, “non-biased”, “fair”, “considerate”, “honest”…? Our dictionaries differ, and we do tend – as human primates – to give our own point of view a great deal more weight than someone we perceive as “other” than ourselves. We find a lot of words to fight over.

It's hard to unsay the words.

It’s hard to unsay the words.

Last night OPD made a special delivery to my place, unexpectedly. My peaceful evening was shattered by angry voices. Not just angry – the sort of enraged fury that seems unique to people who are frustrated, struggling, emotionally invested, feeling unheard, and coming from a place of learned helplessness and impotent rage. Domestic violence makes that sound. It’s that bit just beyond lovers quarreling, that scary place where imminent violence seems highly likely…. and it’s not okay. Entirely unacceptable to treat love in that frightening, disrespectful, and callous fashion. It’s entirely unacceptable to treat one’s neighbors to it, either. It was after 10 pm, after community “quiet hours” begin, and completely audible through the walls. I could have put in earplugs and turned up the stereo to mask it… but I was acutely aware of two very important (to me) things: firstly, those are my friends over there, treating each other in that shabby fashion. Secondly, and most importantly, many years ago I promised myself I would not be a bystander to domestic violence. No excuses, no fear, no “it’s not my business” – no standing by and letting someone go through that, the way I once had to, isolated, frightened, hurting, injured, and without emotional support.

I threw on my coat, and went next door. We have a shared understanding on the knock we use; a roommate opened the door, knowing it was me. He had that “I’m staying out this, sorry about the noise” look of apology and discomfort on his young face. I nodded as he opened the door ever so slightly wider, and I walked purposefully past him toward the ongoing screaming. I could feel my symptoms surging from my own stress; this particular kind of verbal violence, emotional violence, the screaming at each other with such relentless deaf fury triggers my PTSD just about faster than anything else can – and I needed it to stop. For me. I stepped between them and began the process of separating them, helping them de-escalate, reminding them their behavior is simply not acceptable adult behavior (and no, I don’t care who you are, or who did what, or who is “right”, or the why of any of it all – knock that shit off, it’s not okay).

He had asked her to leave. It’s his place. I backed him up on that, knowing they definitely needed some moments or hours to calm the fuck down and get their heads right. She threw drama “I’m not taking anything! No one will ever find me! I’m never coming back!”. It was bullshit and drama, spoken from an emotional place, feeling hurt, angry, frightened, stressed out, not heard, treated badly… all of the things. Still unacceptable drama and bullshit, and I really wish someone had firmly said as much to me when I was a much younger, very volatile woman, myself. (Boundary setting is a useful skill. I am grateful to have survived my first marriage to undertake to learn some.)

She left, he was still storming, wanting to justify his anger, to explain himself, to demonstrate how his reaction was understandable. I didn’t argue those points, just kept reminding him the situation was not about “right”, only that it was an emotional situation in which his behavior was not appropriate. I pointed out how much time he has taken to grow as a man, to become the man he most wants to be, on his terms, and that this behavior was no part of that. I reminded him that his own dignity and self-respect were at stake here. I reminded him how young she is, and that we are each having our own experience. I reminded him that I, myself, for my own reasons, cannot tolerate that kind of violent behavior in my vicinity, and that indeed I do consider that emotional and verbal violence to be “violent” and that it causes human beings great pain. Hell, he was obviously hurting, himself. He was hurting himself. Hurting her. No one needed to raise a hand in violence; the damage was being done quite efficiently using only words.

I went home, hoping things would stay quiet. Already pretty stressed out to be exposed to the drama and bullshit. Triggered, aware, sad for them – hoping I’d done more good than harm, and hadn’t burned bridges with friends over it. Would I choose to intervene if I knew with certainty it would end my friendship with someone? Yes, I would. That shit is not okay – and its high time people (all of us) were more committed to saying so, each and every time it comes up. Violence? Not okay. Racism? Not okay. Exploitation? Not okay. Being a dick to people on mass transit? Not okay. Small stuff and large stuff. None of my business? Well… I suppose if I am content to watch the world burn, maybe that would be reasonable. I think we can do better. I think we can treat each other well; there are verbs involved, and a shared responsibility for the quality of life for all our neighbors and brothers and sisters and strangers and “others” who are not like us. The screaming and abuse has got to stop though. Non-negotiable, at least for me.

I heard the door open and close next-door, a little later. Quiet voices. I sat with my memories. It was a long time before I slept. I woke this morning, Thanksgiving Day. I woke this morning, grateful. I’m grateful to be alive. To have survived domestic violence – to have survived hell – with a heart still capable of loving, and eager to see my Traveling Partner; the first person to look me in the face in a moment of emotional violence, utter hysteria and rage (years ago, early in our relationship), and say “this is not okay, and you have to stop”. Thank you, Love.

Love matters most.

Love matters most.

Today is a good day to be grateful for the easy stuff – and the hard stuff too. Today is a good day to appreciate love and lovers and moments of profound change of perspective. Today is a good day to be honest, to be frank, to be compassionate, to listen deeply, and to love well. Today is a good day to change the world. ❤

Thank you for reading. Thank you for everything you do to become the person you most want to be. If you’re feeling up to it – let’s change the world. 🙂

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Categories Anxiety, Brain Injury, Free Will, grief, Logic & Reason, Love, Mindfulness, Moments, pain, Parables, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, Relationships, Sleepless Nights, The Art of Being, The Big 5, Words

Embrace It or Change It

November 23, 2016 //
2

I woke to the sound of a pounding no-nonsense rain hammering the chimney cover. It sounds like an act of vengeance, all beat and no melody. Because I enjoy rain, generally, I enjoy the sound. What if I disliked the rain, what then? It rains a lot here.

I glance across the table at my winter coat, draped over the other chair, and near to the heater, where I left it last night. I’d arrived after a rainy commute, pleased that my winter coat kept me both warm and dry. I had been thinking, on and off, about needing a winter coat. My last one managed to wrap me in rain resistant comfort (no longer quite waterproof) for 5 years.

Evening before last, I stood at the light rail platform waiting for the train in the rain, in a crowd, and realizing I just did not want to stand all the way home, and this particular train was clearly going to be standing room only, I ducked into a nearby discount retailer on a whim. Out of the rain, warm and dry, I could pass 15 minutes walking the aisles and thinking about life and then take the next train… Feeling purposeful, I walked to the outerwear section, and flipped through the coats. It was the fabric and cut of the thing that got my attention first, olive drab, cotton blend, and a not-quite-an-army-parka look to it. It made me smile. I tried it on and it fit like it was tailored and felt comfortable to move in. Warm. I tried talking myself out of it by trying on other coats. The alternatives did not fit as well, or (to my eye) look as good. I looked at the price tag – doable. It amuses me now that I didn’t wear it for the trip home that night.

Yesterday  morning wasn’t raining, but it was quite chilly. My coat was warm and dry. Comfortable. When I left the office at the end of the day, it was raining. It rains a lot here. I haven’t yet given this coat a water-proofing, and I wondered how well it would stand up to the rain without it? I arrived home, warm and dry, coat wet but not soaked through. A win all around. I even enjoyed the night walk, through the raindrops, across rain-slick pavement, and over the Hawthorne Bridge, wrapped in warmth. I’d have been completely miserable, soaked to the skin and cold to the bone, without a coat. I guess it’s more or less “winter” here now. I mean, the sort of winter we get, which is mostly chilly and muddy and wet, and not very frozen except for a few days in January, generally, and sometimes some snow in December.

The evening passed fairly quietly, in a state of great contentment. My neighbors were partying, which is common and not usually a problem, but the evening’s fun was doing them in with its excesses on this occasion, and at times that was fairly unpleasant to listen to. We usually hang out together a lot more, but since the break-in I have felt much less social, for no other reason than that this is my space and I intend to reclaim it for myself. I made a point to bitch gently about the noise, they were delighted that I am okay, and honestly I felt the same; reassured that they are okay, too, and that we matter to each other. The remainder of the evening was quiet, and I felt asleep feeling safe and content.

Huh. That’s a lot of words about a rainy evening and a winter coat. I’m not sure why. I think the point I was making is something more or less on the order of “don’t stand around being miserable… change something!” 🙂  As true this morning as it was last night, as it was the night before, as it was on election day, as it has been in the anxious days since then… Don’t like the state of things? Change. Change you, or change your choices, or change your circumstances – or embrace the state of things and change your perspective; it is not a requirement in life that we endure misery indefinitely, and certainly there is no requirement that we choose it. So… why do we? I’m not sure taking time out of a day to troubleshoot that is a productive choice. The why, it seems, mires me in a spiral of discontent. Accepting that choosing misery is something people do, something I have done myself, something I remain capable of, is probably much more valuable than knowing why, exactly. I already know enough to be able to choose change. 🙂

Search all the books that matter most to you, there are still verbs involved. :-)

Search all the books that matter most to you, there are still verbs involved. 🙂

I look around this morning with new eyes, more easily able to see the emotional “wear and tear” of the recent break-in. Resilient? Yes. Able to bounce-back? More so than ever before. Unaffected? Hardly; I see the signs of how the break-in affected my sense of safety and security all around me. Small details let go that are usually well-managed: a pile of odds and ends paperwork things has accumulated on the dining table, quite out of the ordinary for me these days, and I have been avoiding the studio entirely in a less-than-ideally-mentally-healthy way. Small signs that I took the violation of my space pretty hard. Reminders exist, too, in the sudden cessation of socializing with my neighbors; I come home, and lock the door. TV gone, which isn’t that big a deal frankly, but the result rather strangely is that I have spent the evenings and mornings quietly – utter quiet, no stereo, no music, no conversation. I feel safer in the quiet stillness, less likely to overlook an intrusion, or be caught by surprise.

Last night, I filled the apartment with music for a while, as I did over the weekend. This morning I am more awake, more aware of things needing to be done that have been let go for a few days. It has been a week. I’m okay now, save for the remaining indignity of being told what my possessions are “worth” by a faceless corporate entity that very much just wants to profit from my fear of disaster without having to pay out for actual disasters that actually happen. I’ll get through that, too. I am capable of great endurance.

A basic morning.

A basic morning.

I’m also capable of great change. Today is a good day to choose change. Today is a good day to treat myself well, wrapped in a warm coat and a smile, walking in the rain like it just doesn’t matter – because it doesn’t have to be endured, naked and alone. I have choices. 🙂

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