It’s just now daybreak. I’ve got my boots on, and I’m at the trailhead for this morning’s walk. I try to put a couple miles on these boots every day. It’s not everything I need to do to get (or stay) fit, but it’s more than nothing.
I’m thinking about success and failure and the effort involved either way. I’m thinking about the difference between “saying” and “doing” – it’s an important difference. It’s pretty easy to find some measure of success and then, slowly, over time, begin to fail oneself ever so quietly while still rather loudly proclaiming the value of prior successes. It’s very human. The proof is in the results, though. Sometimes it’s necessary to begin again, because I have somehow stopped doing a verb. It’s not on my mind for any particular reason, aside from gratitude that I’ve kept at it with the walking and I’m still on my feet and able to.
Have you given up on some effective practice, maybe without really noticing, or in spite of continuing to talk about how well it works for you? Do you miss it? Will you begin again?
I breathe in the mild Spring morning air. It’s scented with flowers. The trees are in bloom all around. Storm clouds are bunched up overhead, looking a bit like a quilted comforter that has been improperly dried, and left lumpy. The idea of “lumpy clouds” makes me giggle out loud.
I’m in less pain than yesterday and in a much nicer mood so far this morning. I’ve got a bit of a headache and it’s the one I most closely associate with my neck pain, but my arthritis isn’t so bad this morning, and the bone graft site on my left hip isn’t aching ferociously the way it was yesterday. I am so grateful just to hurt less this morning. The walk can become real drudgery when I am in a lot of pain. I generally still do the walk, but it’s certainly less pleasant when my pain is unmanaged.
…soon…
The sky is light enough to walk the trail now. It’s a lovely mild morning for it. I stretch and yawn, grateful for the moment, the opportunity, and the ability. I grab my cane from the passenger seat of the car and begin again.
I jot down some thoughts for later, before I hit the trail. I’m killing a bit of time waiting for a passing rain shower to move on from here to elsewhere before I start down the trail. I’ve got my boots on and my rain jacket. I’m ready. I’m thinking about how much small changes over time have added up to big differences in quality of life, health, fitness, and my relationships. I put those thoughts aside, and head down the trail.
I take the short trail up to a view point, just to grab this picture. There’s nothing extraordinary about it, I just wanted to.
I walk along noticing signs of Spring, although it seems quite early for it. There are trees already leafing out, and flowers beginning to bloom. Seasonal ponds reflect the sky and the surrounding trees from the calm surface of murky water. The ducks don’t mind the muck, quite the contrary, they seem to enjoy it greatly.
A pair of ducks enjoys a quiet breakfast together. Will there be ducklings soon? I wonder but don’t go looking for a nest.
Yesterday, I had the park entirely to myself, although it was a Sunday. Today, in spite of it being a Monday morning, there are quiet a few others enjoying the trail, and though I’ve done my best to give them (and myself) considerable distance, I find myself pausing along the edge of the pond, waiting for someone to walk on past. They don’t stop at the pond; they see me and quickly walk on past. At this early hour, the majority of the folks on the trail are seeking solitude. This is not the “family hour” of the morning. lol
I walk and enjoy the Spring air, fresh from the rain during the night. I tread carefully on the slick muddy path, and silently thank myself for choosing to walk with my cane this morning; it prevents me from losing my footing a handful of times as I walk. I reach my goal, a particular riverside viewpoint, and sensing the approach of another rain shower, turn back up the trail.
Spring flowers and young leaves are plentiful, already.
As I walk, I find myself thinking again about small changes. I’ve not once hit the trail for the first time in Spring and comfortably stepped along at my best pace for multiple miles, then returned home feeling energized and ready for more. If I’ve been off the trail for a few weeks, I start again a bit slower, and tackle shorter distances of level well-maintained (or even paved) trails and build up to the distances and quicker pace. If I haven’t been writing awhile, I generally start with fewer words, and build a practice of regular writing, before I seek to drop lengthy missives on an unsuspecting recipient of my correspondence. If I’m committing myself to a new fitness strategy, I don’t hit the mat (or the gym) with aggressive energy, seeking to max out my weight, reps, or duration – I start light, and build up to my goal. Lots of things seem to work best with small changes and incremental changes over time.
Small changes are on my mind. New doctors, new images, new results, all of these tend to mean new treatment plans, new strategies, and a different way of viewing (and caring for) this fragile vessel and the limitations it has. Improving on my present wellness and fitness isn’t an over-night single-change solution at all. There’s more to it than that, and even with great care and small changes, my results will vary along the way. It’s a journey. Steps on a path.
So… I walk and think, about miles and fitness and pain (and pain management) and what it takes to get the most (and the most joy) out of this fragile vessel in this one mortal lifetime. Walking is my most reliable form of exercise day-to-day – and I want to go further, faster. I picked up a soft elastic ankle “brace” (more of a stretchy sleeve that offers some compression and support than a proper brace), understanding that the biggest limiting factor for my walking is currently my ankle. So, okay. Small change, and incremental improvement over time – it’s a place to start. 😀 New lab results and images make it clear that much of my pain is due to chronic conditions (and in some cases degenerative), and the “penalty weight” I carry (being considerably more than any estimate of “ideal weight” for my size and age) definitely adds additional wear to my body, and it’s a lot to have to carry for this fucked up ankle, and a lot to support for this fucked up back (and neck)… so I give thought to things like nutritional density, calorie restriction, and small changes that could add up to – over time – less weight to carry around. I can’t say I’m super eager to embrace these changes, but lying to myself about the necessity doesn’t get me anywhere I’d want to go. So, I walk and I think, and I consider and I plan. I’ve already started adding some supplements that may improve my general well-being, bone health, energy… I’ve got a good doctor, and so far her recommendations have been skillful. My Traveling Partner is working on his health and fitness, too; being injured has hit him hard, and he’s taking his health quite seriously. (I don’t feel like I’m making this journey alone, which is also helpful.)
I arrive home still feeling encouraged, hopeful, and eager to continue to make small changes. I sip a cup of tea, a new favorite, and think about the Spring garden. Earlier this weekend, I got out into the garden (in a bit of a drizzle) and cut down the last dead bits of the previous year, and pruned Baby Love (a rose that doesn’t know the meaning of winter, apparently). This morning, I thought about early plantings and decided to make time to plant peas, carrots, radishes, and early greens. It’s time, if the calendar and temperature can be relied upon. 😀 I make a plan and get out the seeds.
…My Traveling Partner sticks his head in the door of the studio to tell me my phone is misbehaving. I offer to reboot the silly thing…
Another lovely day unfolds ahead of me. There are things to do, and in the doing there is healing and potentially improved wellness. I hope to be around for many more years to come, gardening, painting, hiking – and beginning again. 😀
Progress can be slow. Progress can be so slow that it becomes useful to play mind games with oneself with regard to the glacial pace of incremental change over time, in order to stay focused, keep practicing, and maintain motivation and engagement with those elusive goals that seem always “out there”, not yet achieved. It’s hard sometimes, and it’s easier – too often – to lose ground out of frustration, or even “losing interest” (in the sense that the commitment to one practice or another is quite separate from the pain of struggling with one issue or another). The tl;dr? Adulting is hard.
This past weekend was an odd one. I fought pain and fatigue most of the weekend. It was a long holiday weekend, but the holiday (Juneteenth) is not truly “mine”. I find it frankly difficult to “celebrate” an event that quite explicitly documents the moral, ethical, and cultural shame (slavery and racism) of my ancestors (and a great many other people who look quite like me). Juneteenth-wise, what makes sense for me, truly, is to make room for quiet reflection; how can I, myself, in this lifetime here/now, do better to eliminate even implicit racism from my thinking, my words, and all my interactions? How can I cast my vote to further improve the quality of life and situations of Black Americans? How can I use my privilege (as someone who is white) more as an umbrella and not as a barrier?
The holiday wasn’t the weekend, though, it was just a piece of it. It was a strange weekend, productive, but also peculiarly emotional and I wasn’t at my best. I had a rough day yesterday, characterized by strong emotions, and in spite of the great start to the day, I mostly felt sort of like I was just a big bucket of slop all weekend long (although it was actually just yesterday that was so difficult). My Traveling Partner did his best to support and care for me. We got a lot done together. It was just a very weird day. I didn’t write at all. Got a couple walks in over the weekend. Got a lot of really good rest. Didn’t paint, or write. Did get a bunch of housekeeping done. There was a lot of honest conversation about deepening intimacy and being closer with my Traveling Partner.
There isn’t that much to say about the details that would have any legit relevance this morning. It’s more that there was honestly a lot of real progress evident, if I take a step back and look at things in a way that directly compares this past weekend to – for example – a similar three day weekend 10-12 years ago. So much difference as to capture a feeling of “being an entirely different person”. I’ve come a long way. I’ve worked at it. A lot. I’ve endured frustration and failure and realizations that this or that practice don’t work out as well as I’d hoped, or that “the progress up to this point doesn’t touch that issue”. My results have varied… but… I have gotten results. Worthy real change in quality of life, for the better (by far). Worth celebrating. Worth making note of it. Worth learning to observe real progress, even when the changes over time seem quite tiny. There’s some hope to be found in this, and I’m finding it. Feels good, even after a day as shitty as yesterday was (though even now I do not understand why it was such a difficult day).
Finding a path to emotional wellness is more challenging than clickbait headlines or upbeat advertising leads us to believe. The encouragement we seek from friends, family, and therapists doesn’t making doing the work involved any less difficult, tedious, or frustrating. Progress is often the result of slow, subtle, small incremental changes over time that can be hard to celebrate, they’re just so… mundane.
It takes longer than we expect, to pull ourselves out of our worst bullshit and move on to better moments.
It takes more work than we expect to learn better self-care, better communication practices, and emotional resilience.
The work we put in often goes wholly unrecognized and unrewarded.
The slogans, homilies, and aphorisms of wellness and positivity can become toxic when forced or inauthentic, or if we just don’t feel any sense of progress or forward momentum.
Our negative self-talk can undermine our progress in therapy.
It’s just all very much a bit hard than it can appear to be through the lens of someone selling us on the idea of wellness, or on some particular treatment plan, new Rx, or catchy buzzword-laden new fad. Like it or not, there’s still quite a lot of actual real effort involved in finding our way through life to become the person we most want to be. It’s complicated.
You’re going to need to “do your own homework” on this one.
There’s no quick route to success in most things. That’s true of mental health, too. No shortcuts. No magic tricks. No cure-all easy “take one pill each day” remedy. No fancy retreat. No instant win. Mental health and emotional wellness do not exist on a fucking scratch-it. It’s not a lottery.
There are verbs involved. Your results will vary. You’ll likely get the best results on the things you are seeking to change or improve upon in your life because you want those changes and improvements. Shit that feels like an obligation or something you are doing to benefit someone else (or because you tell yourself you “have to”) won’t get reliably good results quickly – and it’s already a fairly slow process. I don’t say that to be discouraging; do you. I’m just pointing out that the things you change because you want them are easier. Relatively speaking. For some values of “easy”. It’s all very much still a lot of work.
You can not actually purchase the results you seek.
Do the work.
Seriously. If there’s somewhere in life you want to go, you aren’t going to get there standing still. That’s just real. Do something to move in that direction. Start small. Hell, stay small – small steps are still steps.
I still write about the value in practicing specific practices because a) I still find value in them and b) I’m still fucking practicing. The slow improvements of incremental change over time can seem tedious sometimes. There’s still improvement. It’s just slow – but the slow improvements have tended (for me) to mount up pretty reliably over the years (yes, years – as I said; it’s slow). It’s been worth it. Life is that much better now than it was then. I enjoy my experience of myself that much more now than I did then.
Am I free of stress and sorrow? Nope. Have I tidied up all my chaos and healed all my damage? Nope. Is life effortless and easy? Nope. I’m still 100% made of human, and it’s a very human experience. I’m just saying it’s better, and even, generally, very good. It’s been worthwhile to put in the time and effort to get here. I still went to bed last night without noticing I left the front door unlocked after taking the trash out. Human. I still sometimes say something hurtful to someone I care about. I’m still often way too hard on myself. So human.
It’s still worth the effort to improve my self-care, to learn to communicate more skillfully, to learn to slow down and be fully present, to learn to be kind and compassionate, and to heal. There are just a lot of verbs involved. Some days it’s easier to see where I’ve failed than to see how far I’ve come in such a short time. That’s just real – and also part of being so very human.
I sip my coffee contentedly. It’s a good morning to begin again.
I’m sipping my coffee and reflecting on recent changes I’ve made to medications, diet, lifestyle, goals, environment, practices… you know, changes. I slept well and deeply last night. I don’t know if it is due to switching my one OTC NSAID from Ibuprofen to Aleve. Maybe it is. Maybe it isn’t. Not enough data to make any sort of claims… but I’m enjoying the morning, feeling alert, and in less pain upon waking than has been typical for awhile. So there’s that.
I’ve been drinking more water. Like, a lot more. It seems to help in a number of small ways that amount to a quality of life improvement. Another change. Another good result.
I’ve been working on the way I communicate with my Traveling Partner, and taking steps to be more clear, more kind, and a better listener. Is it helpful? I don’t think I’m the person who can answer that question, but he seems to me to be “more approachable” and generally more willing to be open and seems less “guarded”. Those are nice changes. I invited him to breakfast this morning – I love going to breakfast, and it’s less of a thing for him. I know he’s up for it, though, if he’s not overly busy and isn’t in a ton of pain himself. I need only ask. So – I asked. 🙂 Good results? Well, inasmuch as he’s open to the idea, yeah. I’ll have more in the way of “results” later on – after breakfast? 😀
I’ve been making much healthier choices regarding diet. Less fast food. More veggies. That kind of thing – very basic and rather obvious, but doing it matters. I feel better. My meals seem more satisfying.
Tidying up the studio, and the new desk my partner built for me, is another pretty major change – and I am eager to be in the studio working. It’s gorgeous, spacious, filled with light… I mean… same rather small room, same window onto the side yard, a fence, and a house beyond that. It just feels more “ready for work”. I feel inspired when I step through that doorway.
I think the whole point is that making changes results in actual changes. This results in a further necessity of making room in my experience for the outcomes of those changes. Being open to the differences that come to be – regardless whether they were planned or unanticipated. Change is. Don’t care for the change you made? Make a different one. One step at a time. One practice at a time. One project at a time. One thought at a time. Take it in small pieces. Do you… and also, improve on that by doing differently now and then. Grow with experience.
I’m sipping my coffee and thinking about breakfasts to come.
Evening Light 