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One Moment, Here

February 21, 2016 //
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I really wanted to sleep in this morning. For the past several evenings I have been up later than is my general practice, not for any specific purpose just not sleepy enough earlier to make trying to sleep worthwhile. I don’t mind, there’s always another chapter in another excellent book, or some quiet something-or-other than can be done before retiring for the evening. But…it’s helpful if I can also comfortably sleep later the next day. Hasn’t been working out this weekend, I am awake with the dawn at the latest, and that has been a compromise, attempting to return to sleep after waking seriously too damned early to want to be up.

It may have felt too early, but this morning I woke to a beautiful sunrise just beyond the window. Worth it.

It may have felt too early, but this morning I woke to a beautiful sunrise just beyond the window. Worth it.

It’s been the sort of weekend that each deviation from plan, desire, or intent, has proven to be an outcome just beyond ‘enough’, and often splendidly beautiful, unexpectedly positive, delightful, or noteworthy in some pleasant way. It has been helpful that I’ve been open to each change as it has developed, finding myself moments of wonder and joy along a path I didn’t expect to tread.

Another unexpected outcome of the weekend’s peculiarly unscripted unfolding has been that I wake on a Sunday without plans or planning. The Friday evening I’d intended to spend with my traveling partner ended up spent on laundry, meditation, study, and art. The Saturday morning I’d planned to do laundry was spent on art, writing, and yoga. My Saturday evening date canceled for his own reasons, without animus, and I ended up spending Saturday evening with my traveling partner. Now here it is Sunday…and somehow the usual housekeeping got done between other things. I like a tidy home, particularly if I might be entertaining, but I so dislike ‘project housekeeping’ of the sort that is frenetic activity immediately prior to guests arriving that I just won’t do that. I ‘clean as I go’ generally, and on Sunday often put in a routine 2-3 hours of really detailed cleaning. Today it just isn’t necessary, and the laundry is done. The errands I ran yesterday, between the morning and evening, knocked out much of the miscellany that had been on my mind since I moved. So… now what?

...And birdsong included.

…And birdsong included.

I watch the sunrise develop beyond the window of my studio, sipping my coffee. I contemplate change, choice, and perspective. These are among my favorite themes to consider, and how lovely a metaphor is a sunrise? 🙂

…But what to do with the day? I feel a yearning for… something. Something new, but not complicated. Something beautiful, but not remote. Something precious and perhaps limited – rare? Commonplace beauty that is rare doesn’t sound easy to find, and actually it sounds more like a Zen riddle.

I could really benefit from a good hike, out in the trees. I see runners passing by on Fanno Creek Trail, which runs between the sunrise and my studio window. I recall a recent article about a neighborhood park or trails or something to be soon lost with a road expansion… looking it up I read that an uncompleted road became, over time, a neighborhood park along a corridor between back fences, where the road had been planned to be, but never finished. Apparently, the funding and approvals are now a done deal, after so many years, and the plan is to begin construction very soon – when things dry out after the spring rains, most likely. I read quotes from community members irked to lose their greenspace after so long, which seems reasonable; there are no quotes from community members who want the road completed, only civic planners; the traffic in this neighborhood is quite horrific during commuter hours. It’s not a fancy or grand destination, but it is nearby and I’ve never walked those trails – and they may not be there to be walked sometime very soon. Regrets suck, particularly when they are the result of my own choices; today I will take time to walk this mysterious soon-to-disappear trail, because it is there, now. 🙂

A pleasant hike along a local trail isn’t going to take an entire Sunday, and the day remains leisurely, unscripted, and quite delightfully rich with possibilities. Today is a good day to enjoy the day, without expectations, without demands, without insistence on or adherence to an agenda. Today is a good day to listen deeply, to be gentle with myself and the world, and to let the day unfold as it will. Isn’t that enough?

Sometimes finding a happy place is surprisingly close to home.

Sometimes finding a happy place is surprisingly close to home.

 

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Categories Brain Injury, Free Will, Healthy Living, Love, Metaphors, Mindfulness, Oregon Trails, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, Relationships, solo hiking, The Art of Being, The Big 5, Words

Catching Up On Missed Details

February 10, 2016 //
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Fatigue still seems to be catching up to me unexpectedly easily. I wake comfortably this morning after a restful night, and not overly concerned about it, but it turns my attention to a number of life’s details that were quickly shifted to ‘later’ during the move, and attending to them makes sense, certainly putting them off indefinitely is a poor choice.

After yoga, a shower, and making coffee I remember that the quantity of coffee on hand is quite low. I order coffee, and recall that the wall heater uses considerable energy (costly) and that I had planned to get a second oil heater to keep the more spacious apartment comfortable; I make a note for later. While I am involved thus, I make a point of identifying assorted other quality of life details that need to be adjusted or refreshed for the new living space, and if nothing else, I give each sufficient consideration to have an idea what I will do about them, and when. I take time to consider my ‘breakables’ – a collection of delicate glass, porcelain, and crystal objects that I enjoy displaying and using; I made a point of boxing them all up for safety when it was clear that the environment was putting them at risk (before I moved into Number 27), and they have remained packed up since. No curio. (They used to ‘live in’ my sideboard, unless they were out, here and there.) I’ve bookmarked a couple lovely pieces to finish the dining room – a lighted glass door cabinet, and a cute chest with drawers that will serve well as a smallish sideboard; they compliment the light wood of the table. I find myself regularly brushing my hair out of my eyes and recognize that the more immediate need is for a haircut; I have Monday off, and book an appointment.

The day starts in this very grown up way, taking care of the needs of the moment, planning out the future quality of life improvements, and smiling that there is any sense that my quality of life actually needs any ‘improvement’. The smile pulls my attention, somehow, back to the quality of my life, generally, and the moment of contentment and appreciation finishes, rather amusingly, with the recollection that I don’t have a good mop for the much larger kitchen/dining room floor. I order one; that’s a ‘sooner than later’ detail, since a dirty floor will render a home seemingly filthy even when that is the literal only messy detail. (I am no longer that woman who has no will or energy available to live beautifully; I have the verbs for that.)

I feel relaxed and confident in my space and in my experience – and this feeling doesn’t feel ‘alien’ or unfamiliar. It feels more as if something treasured that was missing has been found. I think over my recent nightmare, still clinging to my consciousness, and the epiphany that followed and weave it together with the recollections of times past when I felt my most whole, my most adult, my most capable, and the when/where of those experiences – unsurprisingly nearly all of them at points in my life when I was living alone, however briefly… (with one notable exception; my relationship with my traveling partner, which tends generally be to very adult-to-adult with the exception of an extraordinary period of care and support when I needed it most, struggling to wean myself off of poorly chosen psych meds, and later when we were both working through issues associated with my injury, or my PTSD).

Trying to force myself to live comfortably in a pair-bonding cohabitation model of existence hasn’t worked out well for me, in any relationship. Attempting to cohabit with multiple adult partners (and their multiple very human issues) didn’t work out very well, either (although I could see myself trying again with a more rational choice of partnerships – a choice of more rational partners?). I find myself again and again allowing myself to be lead into over-compromising my needs, my values, or my quality of life solely to avoid confrontation, when I live with other people. It’s silly – and not a very efficient way to live harmoniously. Festering resentment is super unpleasant to live around, and to be quite reasonable about it, my anger is not something to be trifled with, but that’s a truth that is often not heard between primates until shit goes really wrong. Then it’s all neighbors on the news with quotes like “well, she always seemed very pleasant, I’m very surprised…”. It’s not a place I want to find myself, frankly. So. Other choices.

I am still getting used to the spaciousness here. Gone the utterly necessary compactness of … everything. Am I rambling? If I am, is it because there is so much additional room here? More than enough – which feels a tad strange very often, still. The roominess here, for one person, is ‘ample’. Perhaps even ‘ideal’ (for me). The idealness of it is taking some getting used to, and there is some point in my consciousness I occasionally catch discontentedly searching for ‘the worm in the apple’. Freaking human primate negative bias issues – like I need that bullshit! 🙂 Meditation works well to address that… I think I’ll do that.

Begin again... And then again. Each dawn is a new beginning.

Begin again… And then again. Each dawn is a new beginning.

Today is a choice day to begin with good choices. Today is a lovely day to spend the day on loving, and being love. Today is a fine day to reflect on the woman in the mirror, and the opportunity to live well that stretches ahead. Today is a very good day to take care of me, and in doing so I am changing my world.

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Categories Brain Injury, Free Will, Healthy Living, Logic & Reason, Mindfulness, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, Relationships, The Art of Being, The Big 5, Words

And Now for My Next Trick…

February 4, 2016 //
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Yesterday the internet was connected, with some effort and a very tall technician from Argentina. Originally from Argentina, I mean – it would be silly to send someone so far, literally, to connect FiOS. 🙂 I found his exotic accent pleasant.

This morning I found my internet connection… wasn’t. 😦 Funny how little stress that ever really causes me, and I find myself wondering if that is a byproduct of having once worked technical support for a connectivity provider in my very first call center job… 18 years ago. I ponder the passage of time and sip my coffee while I power cycle the router and restore my connection to the world. It’s a simple thing, each moment of self-sufficiency in life is another opportunity to chill, to be content, to feel safe. There is something so powerful in self-reliance – without it, what do I have to offer the world reciprocally? There’s something there to think over… maybe another time.

Another day dawns

Another day dawns, and change is.

My desk here is next to a window looking out on the park, and positioned very near to the corner of the unit – and the building – and the sound of rain on the eaves this morning is loud enough to hear very clearly. I go with the stillness and the sound of rainfall this morning, adding only the percussion of fingers on keys. At one point, I find myself ‘feeling it’ almost as music, tapping my toes along with the sounds of morning. Smiling at myself when I notice, it is a moment of pure pointless joy without reason or excuse required. This room feels good for writing, for painting… it is the ‘master bedroom’ no longer. This is my studio. 🙂

I feel pretty settled in and ‘at home’ here already, which is such a different experience for me – is it really just that I slowed it down and moved in more completely while I was moving out, sparing myself weeks of upheaval and disarray? Is it that I did so much of it entirely myself? I grin thinking about the thousands of pounds of goods I moved, and the legion of tiny bruises from bumping this thing, bracing that thing, hauling some awkward bit over here, or over there; I got it done as planned, almost precisely. There’s a strange delight in seeing things unfold as planned. I think briefly of another experience – not the ‘unplanned disaster’ or the ‘unplanned but awesome’ experiences, instead I think for just a moment of the ‘carefully planned experience that becomes completely derailed, fully failed, no effective alternative, shit just going sideways on every detail full on panic’ experience… scary. I realize as my mind veers away from the sense of that experience how very frightening I find it, and far more so than the outcome of anything unplanned. I use the moment to consider how I can better appreciate qualities of the unplanned experiences in life to ease the stress of failed planning in other moments; instead of feeling the pain and fear of the planning going to pieces in some horrible way, learning to take a needed step back, a few deep breaths, and take the opportunity to let go comfortably, to go ‘off script’ in those moments, and let it become unplanned at that point – instead of fervently holding on to the failed planning, grieving the discomfort or turmoil of the changing situation, instead learning to embrace it as a chance to do something wholly new and previously unconsidered – or to find the value in what had been rejected before. I make some notes – real pen and ink on paper notes – to consider this further, later.

Yeah...but still some work to do.

Yeah…but still some work to do.

I pause to make another cup of coffee and return to my desk. I’m very aware this morning, as I sit in this one room that is not yet ‘totally moved in’, that my moving in is not yet completed; this is the one space in which that is quite obvious. There are books stacked everywhere, strange vaguely lop-sided towers of books in varying sizes that show off both some skill at balancing objects, and also some lack of good judgement. Almost on cue, a precarious stack of books topples over. I wonder that I didn’t notice that I’d brushed it on the way by, or somehow shifted it. I laugh, because it’s not as if they’ll be damaged. I feel a moment of appreciation that these were not my first editions (which are already put on shelves) and recall a conversation with someone who asked me ‘why is it a big deal if a book is a first edition?’ It isn’t of course, and that was my answer; it’s merely an unnecessary way of making a book seem special, or ‘collectible’. The words within are truly enough.

Speaking of words… On the other hand, let’s not. At least, not this morning. I do have words and language on my mind lately. Thoughts to think over about how I communicate, why it matters to feel heard, and what it says to me when someone silences me – certainly, I am a studied expert on what I understand it to mean when I am silenced. It’s likely both an experience that is specifically part of who I am myself and how I take the world’s messaging, and also probably very common and very human.

The rain keeps falling. I’ve run out of things to say. The stacks of books, and a couple of small boxes of ‘desk stuff’ that are not yet unpacked now have my attention. I’ve some time before I head to work… and it is a lovely morning to live beautifully and take care of me. I think I’ll do some of that. 🙂

I haven't even left for work, and I am already eager to return home.

I haven’t even left for work, and I am already eager to return home.

Today is a good day to be here in this moment, now. I’ll be getting on with that…

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Categories art and the artist, Brain Injury, Free Will, Healthy Living, Mindfulness, Perspective, The Art of Being, Words

Choices and Changes

January 28, 2016 //
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Moving is a process that is pretty much entirely all about changes. Sometimes moving is is also associated with a lot of ‘forced choices’; things decided upon in the moment that are either imposed by someone else’s decision-making, or by details in the circumstances that seem to limit the available options. (I say ‘seem to’ because sometimes I find myself making a choice based on it being ‘the only thing I can do’, which while it does immediately ensure that my perspective is that there is ‘no choice’, in reality ‘no choice’ is a rare condition.)

Last night I slept deeply and well in the old apartment, even crashing quite early, utterly exhausted. I woke earlier than my usual waking time, and although I was contentedly committed to returning to sleep for as long as I needed to rest, the attempt was wasted. I was awake. My thought, when I crashed out last night, was that I would wake later – probably after 7:00 am (the hour at which the community ‘quiet hours’ end). The intention was to immediately finish loading up the van and drive it down the hill, unload it, then have my morning coffee. I woke at 4:00 am, much too early to futz around with moving things, and a noisy truck. People were definitely still sleeping. (Yes, that matters to me; Consideration is  one of my Big 5 relationship values – are not my neighbors also sharing a relationship with me? That of neighbor?) I decided to dress, and take the frozen food down to the new apartment, and have my coffee while I watch the dawn slowly unfold over the park, from the new view.

The darkness before dawn is dotted with bright lights.

The darkness before dawn is dotted with bright lights.

What a lovely morning, and what an excellent bit of decision-making! I returned to the old apartment some time later – after coffee number two, and 7:00 am. The rainy morning has prolonged the early morning gray misty skies, and dim lighting that might put my footing at risk. I choose a healthy breakfast, a few minutes at the keyboard, and no rush; I am up so much earlier than I planned that I am still entirely ‘on plan’ for the moving bits without rushing at all.

The choices I am making with regard to handling the move in this peculiarly slow deliberate way is also resulting in feeling more immediately moved in at the place. This morning felt right; I had my morning coffee ‘at home’ – and that was there, at the new place, sitting on the love seat in the living room, watching the sky lighten beyond the treeline on the other side of the park. Meditation. Yoga. A shower. I make no promises to myself about how this is going; it is enough to experience it.

A metaphor for change: the mantle shelf covered with treasured things that will not remain in this location. Sometimes the choices and changes are momentary.

A metaphor for impermanence: the mantle shelf covered with treasured things, safer on the shelf than on the floor, they will not be here long.

Isn’t that still what this is all about? Choices…changes… enough? 🙂

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

Being Committed

January 27, 2016 //
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Sipping my coffee I look again at the title and chuckle. No, I have not lost my mind, nor am I ‘being committed’ in some involuntary way in some moment of desperation. I meant it as ‘being committed to’ a concept, opportunity, event, plan, or task. In this case, I might even quite reasonably expect that I could be talking about being committed to the move, or to change, or some other loosely move-related experience, since today is Moving Day. Well, a moving day; I’ve got more than one. (A nice feeling.) Actually though, this morning I am taking time over my coffee to explicitly reinforce my personal commitment to treating myself well, and to general contentment and sufficiency.

Boxes, bags, bins, a cart, a van, some help, a sense of purpose, and three days ahead.

Boxes, bags, bins, a cart, a van, some help, a sense of purpose, and three days ahead.

I am excited about the move, and noticed at some point yesterday that the excitement is causing me a certain amount of dithering in my decision-making processes. Silly things like ‘what goes first?’ and ‘should I just go ahead and move the kitchen?’ – when in the simplest most obvious terms, everything will be moved, and it will happen over the next 3 days. There is no need to attempt to prioritize this room, over that; I can literally (if I wish) simply start walking items downhill one at a time. I would be moved in 3 days – I don’t have that much stuff.  🙂  This morning I awoke more clear-headed on the challenge; it’s not about the move at all, as much as it is about feeling fearful of giving up this state of general contentment, comfort, and security which has become my ‘normal’. It is an important realization that has allowed my morning to progress peacefully and without further stress (at least so far).

I continue to sip my coffee without further thought about the move or the moving; no further thought is required at just this time right here, and I very much need a few fearless calm minutes of contentment over words and coffee. Taking care of this fragile vessel and the being of light within is every bit as high a priority as this move. 🙂

I notice the deep quiet of early morning, and listen; there is the usual hushed coming and going of distant commuter traffic, and the buzz of the overhead light in the kitchen. I remind myself to alert the manager that the bulb is ready to be replaced – and realize I am ‘moving’ in my head, again. I breathe, and let it go. I put on my ‘moving playlist’ and enjoy a morning filled with music; I’ll be unplugging things today, and a house filled with music may be a day or two away once I do. lol I remember I’ll want my headphones, and put them next to my phone. Damn it. Still moving in my head. LOL Clearly … I am committed.

It's still 'about' contentment and sufficiency.

It’s still ‘about’ contentment and sufficiency.

Today will be a good day for balance, and a good day to keep checking in with the woman in the mirror. Today will be a good day to take things task by task, and to treat myself gently. Today is a good day for practicing good self-care, and being kind to myself. Today is a good day to change… apartments. 😉

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