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Ways, Truths, Paths

June 30, 2017 //
0

I woke in a lot of pain this morning, and it feels like it is going to be a hot day. My device says 84 degrees (F), so manageably hot, I guess. It’s a “boxing day” today (packing things up to move), and a chance to get some laundry done, too. I smile and enjoy the awareness that in the new place I have my own washer and dryer in the house, saving both time and money.

It’s a nice morning for gratitude. Yesterday ended on a difficult note at work, not “bad” just… work. Real work. Work that matters. Work I am satisfied and rewarded by. Still work. Still requires working. However difficult the work at hand, I also felt valued and appreciated by my colleagues and my boss, which feels… amazing. So far a very healthy environment for me. I definitely seek to spend more time appreciating those good qualities than dwelling on one difficult day – that still ended very well, with work I am proud of.

Yesterday I also had the opportunity to “be there” for a friend who needed a moment to be heard. We all do, now and then, right? I was glad to be there when he needed someone, and it was good to reconnect.

Another friend is gathering his resources and harnessing his will, considering making a 750 mile drive north to see me, hang out, and help me move. I’m pretty blown away by his affectionate regard that he would do so. I smile every time I consider it – and will for a long while, whether he is able to make it or not. He really wants to. That’s awesome. 🙂

Tonight I will get to hang out with other far away friends, in town visiting a friend who isn’t so far away, and who I enjoy but rarely break out of my routine to see. Yeah, that’s a thing – I’m very human. 🙂 I’m eager to see them all, this evening. Maybe my Traveling Partner will accompany me, although probably not; he is still recovering from his recent surgery, and travel would likely be very awkward.

Life isn’t always easy. I got home last night still suffering the day. The time I spent hanging out with a friend helped. The time I spent meditating helped further. The sleep I got, deliciously restful, found me waking with the dawn and a smile, eager for a cup of coffee, having let go of any lingering stress from the prior day. This ability to bounce back developed over time, and I can’t provide any really sound expectations about “how soon” or “when”…because it is a slow, gradual thing that was an incremental change over time with so many setbacks and “will this never end?!” moments that it was a little like I simply woke one day… changed. I suppose it was sometime between when I began and yesterday, right? lol So… let’s go with an easier question, okay? “How many days from the day I first began “practicing the practices” has it been to achieve yesterday’s results?” That I can answer – after I choose a staring point. So… I think I have to look at two different starting points, and answer with a range. First starting point; when my Traveling Partner recommended that I read The Four Agreements (it’s linked on my Reading List), which puts me around 2,575 days (7.05 years – bit of a long haul, frankly). Okay, that sounds… long. Impossibly long. Second starting point, would be when I began with my current therapist, shortly after I started writing Evening Light, putting me at a more comfortable to contemplate 1,610 days (4.4 years). Soooo… it’s taken me, depending on how I look at where I began, between 4 and 7 years to get this far from where I began… that sounds like a long time to have to “wait”, but there have been verbs involved, so I haven’t exactly been “waiting”…

…It hasn’t seemed so long. The quality of life improvements over time began quickly with small things, and have been entirely worth the work, the verbs, the constant practice, the regular beginning again… It’s a lot to commit to, though. So… I haven’t. I’ve refrained from committing to a specific outcome, and focused mostly on moments, practices, and treating myself (and other people) with great consideration and compassionate understanding – neither of which came naturally to me, so, yeah – practice. A lot of practice.

…I’m not “there” yet. I don’t know that there is a “there” at all. I just know that this morning is quite lovely, even though yesterday was difficult in spots. I know I am well-loved, even though I am, myself, quite difficult in spots. I know that so much of my experience is within my ability to choose change, even though that sometimes feels difficult in spots. I know, too, that anytime things are difficult – I can begin again, right here, now, in this spot. 🙂

It’s a good day to practice being the woman I most want to be. We become what we practice. ❤

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Categories Anxiety, Brain Injury, Free Will, Frustration, Healthy Living, Logic & Reason, Love, Mindfulness, Moments, pain, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, Summer, The Art of Being, The Big 5

Moving and Moving Forward

June 28, 2017 //
2

It’s a comfortably cool, somewhat humid morning. The red-wing blackbird outside the window is piercingly reminding me that the feeder is empty.  It is, and that’s because it is fully summer, and there is no “food shortage” out there in the meadow and marsh this time of year, and I moving very soon. It’s time to prune back the roses for traveling – although this year a friend with a truck seems likely, and perhaps I won’t need to cut them back so much as the last two times I moved? I am now full of enthusiasm for this move, and I smile even thinking about my initial anxiety and frustration with having to, now that I’m past that.

…It’s still really hard to get started. It’s time to box up all the books and breakables. It’s time to take down all the paintings that are hanging. The more prepared I am, and the more small work I’ve done to be ready for the movers (and friends coming ’round to help out with moving), the less time I have to spend actually moving, and the less I have to pay the movers for fewer hours of their work. It’s still really really hard to do the first thing – whatever it ends up being. Beginning again, as often as I say the phrase, sounds so… easy. Just… do the thing, right? Yeah. That’s totally true, and also… totally not as easy as it sounds, often. lol Where to begin?

Any new journey begins somewhere. A moment, a location, an opportunity, a choice; a change-in-progress has to have begun with something. So, this morning I’m a bit hung up on that beginning, because this upcoming weekend kicks off the packing of things into boxes. 🙂 When I go to get the keys, I’d ideally like to have a carload of stuff with me, to bring into the house – I mean, I’m making the trip there, the end result of which will be keys in hand, right? It just seems practical to take stuff over with me. What to bring in that first car load, though? I consider the most likely immediate needs at both ends of the move… a drink of water, a cup of coffee, a quick bite to eat, or a trip to the rest room… someplace to sit down… a plan begins to form.

I figure I can easily take over one or another of three coffee solutions at hand. I’d need to have at least one coffee mug, at least one drinking glass. Packing the pantry seems an easy step, too. A quantity of my breakables have never been unpacked here in this apartment, although I had the space for them – I never reached my “buy a new hutch or curio” goal, in my budget. Higher priorities cropped up more than once over the course of the year. Moving them over is easily done…and goes a long way toward making me feel at home in the new place, and also more relaxed about the move by getting them out of harm’s way early on.

So the morning over coffee goes… I make a list, think it over, shuffle it around, consider cubic footage of space in the car… pack it in my head, unpack it, re-pack it. By the time the day is here, this will feel planned and routine – and hopefully comfortable. I rely on that feeling of preparedness and ease to keep my anxiety at bay; every time I move seems to “change everything”, and getting settled can be a long process for me.

I’m pre-occupied with moving – fortunately, I find it also a great “living metaphor” and as the process unfolds, I am also considering the woman in the mirror and her journey. It’s time to set down some baggage, and get more comfortably moved into my life, and my experience. It may not be easy to get started, but it is time to “walk on” from one thing to the next, with a full tool box full of verbs, and a better idea of who I am – and who I want most to be. My results may vary, but I can begin again, and begin again, and begin again – and incremental change over time is unavoidable; we become what we practice. So.

Begin again? Sure. This path definitely leads somewhere…

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

Assorted Extras

June 26, 2017 //
0

It’s been crazy hot this week, so far, and I’m relieved that there are cooler temperatures in the forecast now. The lack of shade on this apartment, now, results in being unable to cool it enough during the night, or in the early morning, to achieve any sort of comfortable indoor temperature the next day. It reached 100 degrees (F) yesterday, maybe a tad more, outside, and inside it reached almost 90. I still managed to smile, and most of that is due to the knowledge that the new place has A/C, and the recollection of hotter places I have lived (the desert… Fresno…). Besides, it was too hot to do more than lay around quietly breathing, sweating, and drinking water. LOL

I managed sleep, which was nice. I feel okay this morning. Somewhat… sticky… even after my shower.

Weird day, and I ride the emotional currents without concern, without fighting it. I’m okay. Today I’m out of the office providing logistical and emotional support to my Traveling Partner, who is having a procedure done. I’m sipping my coffee, alert for that moment when it is time to leave the house to catch the train to catch the bus to be at the place at the time. All very routine, somehow.

Over time, more of the things that once wracked me with anxiety or provoked tears or anger just… don’t. I’m fine – and I’m fine to my very core, without any particular noteworthy effort beyond routine good self-care practices, and meditation. It’s nice. It would have been wonderfully encouraging to have been able to foresee improvements over time, or rely on them utterly with the kind of certainty that comes of knowing things. Clearly that’s not really a thing for me; I’m pretty sure friends and loved ones may even have suggested, helpfully, that I “try meditation”. I’m pretty sure I’ve done so for others, and gotten the very same result my own friends got with me; “I’ve tried that, doesn’t work for me”, “I’ve tried that, I don’t think I’m doing it right”, “I don’t know how to do that”, “if it doesn’t come in a pill at great price, it can’t possibly work”, “if it requires my personal accountability or effort I’m not interested”, “not if I have to change who I am”, “I can’t.” Well, shit. That about covers, doesn’t it? Do you. 0_o

We become what we practice. Over time, in increments, in moments, by way of our choices, by way of our repeated thoughts, repeated actions, repeated words – we become what we practice. We build ourselves and rebuild ourselves, we tear ourselves down, we allow the world to tear us down, too. In spite of that, it seems far to simple – impossibly simple – that this very same notion of incremental change over time could be applied quite willfully. Sometimes the easy answers are the hardest ones just because we aren’t convince-able. We won’t, more than we can’t.

Where is your will this morning? Maybe just some really small thing that would be just the tiniest bit better… that could be doable, right? For me it may have begun, if I follow the thread all the way back, with a gentle suggestion that I try getting up earlier in the morning, and slowing down my routine to give myself time to really be awake before starting my day. No kidding. Sure, I still went through some major changes, bullshit, drama, upheaval, hurting – even hitting the bedrock of rock bottom, emotionally, came after that…but that moment, choosing to change my routine, exploring that one tiny seemingly insignificant change, was a domino, and the rest started falling into place over time.

What are you practicing?

It’s already time to begin again. 🙂

If not this moment, when?

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

Enough and Too Much

June 24, 2017 //
1

I didn’t get anything like enough sleep last night.

I saw a great little duplex early in the morning. I got home feeling hopeful and eager, but without any cause to make assumptions about the outcome. The unexpected phone call late in the afternoon, letting me know the unit is mine, and gently inquiring if I am still interested… well, sleep just didn’t come easily on the level of excitement that resulted. I still needed to get up early this morning to return the Zipcar I’d reserved. (From the perspective of going to and from the new place from this place it seemed practical to use a car, instead of public transit.)

Today, I’ll meet up at… holy cow… my new place (wow, I’m still so excited!) to pay the deposit. I’ll take public transit out from downtown (near the office) to the house and try out the commute for ease and travel time on a day when neither is critical.

It’s funny… my move before last, bringing me to the apartment community I currently live in, was a product of months of searching, looking at units, exploring the communities near work, and emotional uncertainty reinforced by Other People’s Drama (well… and mine, too, let’s be real). The choice never felt like it was really mine; it was the choice I ultimately had in front of me when the time came that moving was no longer optional. This current experience began with a similarly forced feel to it, then… it cracked open and changed completely when I met my new landlords yesterday morning, and got my first look at what will be home for the next year (and perhaps as much beyond that as life carries me before I purchase a place truly my own). I walked away feeling yearning and wistful to have the little duplex be my own, before a decision was made; I actually really like it. My landlords strike me as delightful people, and we connected over morning conversation, finding each other more alike than different, really wanting there to be a connection – and creating that experience together, over a common experience; we like that little duplex. 🙂

So, the move is on! It’s real. I have a new place, an old place, and a journey to make between them. Aaaaaand… the move date is sooner than I expected, and a comfortably negotiated compromise for both them and for me. I’d have liked to make the move later, to amass greater resources. They’d like to avoid having it vacant. They are, themselves, moving to another place, in another community. I’m scrambling… and yesterday the excitement caught up with me and wrecked my sleep utterly.

An unexpected visit late in the evening by my Traveling Partner, on his way from one moment in life to another, was an emotional salve and then some. He’s a very calming influence in stormy emotional seas. I wasn’t having tantrums, or meltdowns, or raging – but I was “over excited” like a little kid, and just couldn’t seem to soothe myself or achieve the sort of calm that promotes sleep. He knows me well. He knew just what to do about it to be helpful, and when he left I put out the lights, and called it a night. There really wasn’t anything “wrong” – I’d just had too much of all sorts of good things. 🙂

It’ll be some days before the move properly begins to show signs of actual movement between places, but I’ve got boxes ready, and a to do list, and a lot of experience. The excitement of it lingering in my memory woke me ahead of the alarm clock. I get the morning started, yoga, shower, writing and coffee, and…

…The anxiety hits me like a wall. What if I’m wrong? What if this is a terrible idea? What if this all goes horrible awry? What if it is too good to be true? I pause and stare across the meadow for a while; this won’t be my view much longer. Lingering dew sparkles on the grass and the points of the needles of the pine that seems so poorly placed, just beyond the patio. I sip my tepid coffee. I breathe. I relax. Change is. Sometimes that’s scary. It’s hard to trust myself – harder than I’d like. Second-guessing and anxiety about the move is going to come and go – because I’m human – and that’s got to be okay, too. I consider other moves, other experiences in life. My coffee is finished. I’m smiling.

It’s time to begin again.

…It’s a new dawn…it’s a new day… it’s a new life for me…

 

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Categories Anxiety, Brain Injury, Free Will, Love, medical marijuana, Mindfulness, Moments, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, Relationships, Sleepless Nights, Summer, The Art of Being, The Big 5, Words

It’s a New Dawn, It’s a New Day…

June 23, 2017 //
0

Ready? Let’s do this!

…It’s a new dawn…it’s a new day… it’s a new life for me…

…And I’m feeling…good. 🙂

…I feel right…

…even…happy.

It’s a nice morning. Things to do. I ended the day, yesterday, on a bitter note. I was overcome by sorrow and tears. I’ve no idea why. Tired? Hadn’t meditated? Wasn’t sufficiently well medicated to support needed emotional resilience? All of those things, I suspected at the time, and what was weird is that although I was totally overcome by it, and also utterly unable to lift a hand to help myself – even though I knew what I needed to do – I still somehow managed it, rather by happenstance; I was trying to make an angsty moody sort of post on Facebook, pretty typical really, and quite human, and I went to attach an appropriate picture to that post… I kept scrolling through pictures of smiles, and pictures of flowers, and pictures of forest hikes, and pictures of the way the light hits the water in the summertime, and… I started giggling, just a bit hysterically. I just couldn’t find “photographic evidence” to support my misery in the moment. LOL I’m okay. A fears tears aren’t fatal. 😉

Growth over time. We become what we practice. New self-care practices built over time become default habitual behaviors that support us.

The evening actually ended well. My moody moment was obviously more biology that emotional reaction to things, or events, and I finished the evening taking care of me, and noodling around on my bass, calmly, contentedly – and then crashing out rather later than I intended – so this morning I slept in a bit. 😀

There’s an entire lovely day ahead… I wonder where my path leads today?

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Categories anhedonia, Anxiety, Brain Injury, Free Will, health, Healthy Living, medical marijuana, Mindfulness, Moments, more than a little bit of bitching, pain, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, Summer, The Art of Being, The Big 5, Words
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