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Appreciating What I Can

January 19, 2017 //
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Appreciating what I  can in life seems best paired with not taking the shit I don’t appreciate at all personally. It is a decent arrangement, generally, resulting in considerable calm and contentment. This morning, I am appreciating sleep – the sleep I didn’t get last night – and I’m not taking at all personally that I didn’t get the sleep I needed, which, while I don’t appreciate that, wasn’t at all personal. Sometimes I can’t sleep through the goings on in the world, however local or remote, and sometimes I can’t sleep through what’s going on in my head. I really do enjoy deep restful quality sleep, though. 🙂

With regard to the sleep I did not get last night, it matters far more that I am awake now, alert, feeling merry, and more or less ready for the work day. With just Friday (and today) between me and the potential for sleeping in (on the weekend), this is doable. There’s no tragedy here, and barely any inconvenience. My lack of sleeping is not associated with anxiety or tinged with negative emotions. I am in a manageable, minimal, amount of pain. “My glass is more than half full”, meaning to say that I enjoyed the evening in the company of my Traveling Partner, and feel cared-for and well-loved. Even with the poor night’s sleep, the day begins well. I definitely appreciate that. 🙂

The snow melted away slowly in yesterday’s steady rain. The commute to work was treacherous and slick; the thin layer of water on all the accumulated ice was far more slippery than ice or snow alone ever could be. I skated awkwardly along the walking portions of my commute, appreciative of bus service that kept the walking portion shorter than usual, by far. As the day went on, the snow continued to melt. The journey home wasn’t especially treacherous, slippery, or complicated – just wet.

Coming home to real partnership is something I appreciate, too. My cardboard recycling had begun to pile up, bins were full after the holidays, and later an icy parking lot I could not safely cross on foot with my hands full prevented me handling things. I felt uncomfortable with the clutter, and it had begun to aggravate me. I arrived home to find that my Traveling Partner had taken care of it, and any number of other things: putting away clean dishes, hanging the closet door that so recently came loose unexpectedly in my hands, installing a replacement external hard-drive (he’d also taken time to locate as many of my old back up files and images archived on his network as he could identify, and had already put them on the new drive for me). My quality of life when I returned home was notably improved over when I departed for work in the morning. It’s lovely to be cared for. I appreciated, too, the sweet relief of connecting and sharing time in the same physical space after two weeks of being kept apart by circumstances, pain, or bad weather.

Small things that frustrate or annoy me may have been piling up over time… now, this morning, embracing a moment of appreciation for what is working, what is going well, and what I enjoy in my life, it’s hard to give any weight to small frustrations and inconveniences. It’s a nice change.

My thoughts turn to moving and I find myself wondering if my frustration with not yet finding a new place have been stalling other healthy processes; frustration is my kryptonite, and I try to be mindful of its sway over my thinking when it becomes prominent in my experience. The lease here runs out at the end of the month. The weather has been intensely crappy for house-hunting, or searching for a rental home closer to work, and there are so few hours in the day available for the purpose, at all. There is little time left. Do I sign a six month extension on the lease here? I don’t want to live here anymore. I want a place of my own – really mine, a home. I know so much more about what I want, and what I need, and what is enough… and I haven’t found it, yet. I’m also… not quite ready. I meant to be. The holiday season got in the way of being more prepared, and I made a practical decision about supporting my Traveling Partner’s goals ahead of my own, short-term. We do that for each other now and then, because… love. So… yeah. Six more months here now seems the pragmatic choice, the practical, feasible, doable decision with the least upheaval, for the time being. I would, in all honesty, prefer to move during the summer months, anyway. Less rain falling on paintings being exposed to weather, carried from residence to moving truck, from moving truck to residence. Thankfully, I have options – and an awareness of options. I make an appointment to sign the lease next Thursday, on a day I will be out of the office on other personal matters. I have another week to keep looking. Hell, I found Number 27 less than a week before I moved, back in May of 2015. 🙂

Today isn’t “perfect” – what ever is, really? It’s enough, though. Today is a good day to appreciate having enough. Being enough. Doing enough. I am content with sufficiency. Today that’s enough. 😀

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Categories Brain Injury, Free Will, Healthy Living, Love, Metaphors, Mindfulness, Moments, Perspective, Relationships, Sleepless Nights, The Art of Being, The Big 5, winter, Words

Each Day Like a Gift

January 17, 2017 //
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I am sipping my coffee with an eye on the weather, this morning. The forecast calls for freezing rain, or maybe snow, or some sort of define-ably inclement weather, just about at the time I am planning to be commuting to work. I am watchful, to ensure I am appropriately prepared. No particular anxiety about it; there is still snow on the ground and a lot of ice here and there, and I am already prepared for that.

The weekend was pleasant and restful. I miss my Traveling Partner. Weather has kept us apart; neither of us favors traveling in these conditions unless utterly necessary, and our emotional need to be assured of the other’s safety outweighed our need to be in the same physical place at the same time. Still, I miss him greatly, and I am eager to see him. It probably won’t be tonight. Maybe tomorrow, or Thursday? The weather won’t stay like this indefinitely. Change is.

I face the morning like a holiday gift. I knew it was coming, but I don’t know much more about it than that, so far. I commit to letting the day unfold as it will, and refrain from borrowing anxiety over events that are not yet. My morning doesn’t need that, not even at all. I make room in my morning to enjoy simple pleasures: the warm water in the shower, the ease in my morning yoga routine, my general lack of pain this morning, the feeling of the warm coffee mug in my hands, how pretty the fish are in the aquarium, and the general sense that this feels like a “good day”. I smile and wonder whether other creatures waste their time defining things, or if that is peculiarly human.

I move on with the morning, and take a moment or two for gratitude; it complements pleasure nicely, I find. I feel grateful for the luxury of plumbing, and potable water, electricity and internet access, and the accessibility of well-made, ready-to-wear clothing in so many colors and styles, particularly (this morning at least) fuzzy warm spa socks. I am grateful for less practical things, too: good friends who live nearby, and also dear friends whose affection is not diminished by distance or time spent apart. I am grateful for the opportunity to love, and to learn to love well. I am grateful to have a Traveling Partner on this strange journey that is life. I am grateful to have so much cherished solitude in which to develop deeper self-knowledge, and to grow and become the woman I most want to be. I am grateful for a job I enjoy, am valued for, and have become proficient at, over time. I am grateful for chances – and second chances. I am grateful for perspective, awareness, and education. I am grateful to have the willingness to overturn my opinions in the face of new knowledge.

It’s a lovely quiet morning, preceding a day filled with unknowns. I will approach it with enthusiasm and joy, in anticipation of another day on this journey to… me. Like any gift, the contents are a mystery until I unwrap it, open it up, and see what’s inside. Whether it disappoints me or pleases me greatly probably has more to do with my expectations, and how I face life generally, than the contents themselves. I’m grateful to have the day, regardless.

Today is a good day to begin again. Every journey needs a beginning. 🙂

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Categories Brain Injury, Free Will, Healthy Living, Love, Metaphors, Mindfulness, Moments, Perspective, The Art of Being, The Big 5, winter, Words

A Day for Me

January 15, 2017 //
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When did you last spend an entire day caring for yourself, body, mind, and soul? The works. Like… a spa day for your whole being? Healthy, while also indulgent. Uninterrupted. Focused, and also relaxed. Purposeful, but not hurried. No pressure – your undivided attention on supporting the person in the mirror. I took a day for me, yesterday. It was strangely not at all as I planned it, but… wow. I needed that time. A day of relaxed self-care that was not also pock-marked with fretting about work in the background. A day of small favorite luxuries without any self-consciousness or doubt. A day of meditation, quiet, calm… and wow was it lovely, and soul-soothing, and magical. Well… not actually “magical”. There were verbs involved, and I did those, for me. 🙂

I had intended to enjoy the day at leisure, and this much I most definitely did do. I made a wee cherry clafoutis for my brunch, a delightful treat. I happily enjoyed more coffee than I generally allow myself, content that a late night could be followed by sleeping in. I queued up a good playlist (that I mostly didn’t listen to), and had my sketching supplies, a book I am reading, and a journal at hand. I ended up spending most of the afternoon and evening quietly meditating – not at all the plan, but as it turned out, precisely what I needed to care for me best.

It was late into the evening when the last coals of the fire in the fireplace dwindled away to nothing, and the room began to take on the night chill from a draft somewhere. That was when I realized I had passed something like 10 hours just chilling. No TV. Music only rarely. Not bothering to pick up my book. Writing a note about this or that now and then. Just relaxing with the woman in the mirror, feeling the feelings, letting the cognitive landscape shift and change, accepting the emotional weather – which changed often, and more rapidly than the icy landscape on the other side of the windows. I watched the birds. They watched me back. I sat warming my feet by the fire, and smiling, feeling content that for the moment, all is well (for me, here, right now). It was lovely. I soaked in it. Bathed in it. Wrapped myself in these all-to-brief sweet moments of calm. Savoring them for later recollections, on more difficult days.

Evening from my meditation cushion.

Evening from my meditation cushion.

I don’t remember going to bed. I know I did; I woke in my bed from a deep sound sleep, feeling well-rested, and well-cared-for. That’s a thing I didn’t understand years ago; our very human feelings of neglect, inattention, shabby treatment, and even having been dealt with cruelly or abusively, can be soothed greatly by how we treat ourselves. It doesn’t stop some other person who treats us badly from being who they are, or make circumstances different than they have been, but it has tended to allow me to heal more, faster, and more completely, and to bounce back from challenges more efficiently. Totally worth taking the time to invest in skilled self-care. I’m no expert (clearly). I’ll keep practicing. 🙂

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

What a Strange Winter Journey

January 13, 2017 //
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It’s evening, and rather late. A strange time for me to be writing. I’m okay with that. There’s a warm fire crackling in the fireplace. I’m home, safe, warm, and contented. It’s definitely enough… It’s strange that I’m here, now, tonight.

I went to bed last night with a plan for the work day. I’d be up very early, with the intention of getting into the office by 6:00 am, fully expecting to commit to 12 hours to catch up what had gotten pushed to the side while I worked from home on these recent snowy days. It was a good plan, realistic and carefully considered. I set my alarm. I checked it again, as I got into bed. I had a back up alarm set on my phone. I made sure my alarms were not muted, even though my phone was on Do Not Disturb. Sleep came easily.

…There may have been a moment during the wee hours when I opened my eyes briefly, and only enough to see the time on my fitness tracker, assuring myself it was not yet morning, and returning to sleep, I don’t really know for sure whether the vague recollection is actually from last night…

I woke at 6:19 am. It was much later than I planned to be up. Later than the alarm was set for. Later than I commonly sleep even when I don’t turn on an alarm. Waking was difficult. I was groggy, struggling to understand the beeping. I turned off the alarm. It didn’t go off. I shook it, as though that would do anything. I got up, aware that I was late, and began to dress hurriedly, still not awake, clumsy, awkward, stiff, stupid. I picked up my phone – the alarm was still chiming. I shut it off. I opened my work laptop and typed words intending to communicate I was on my way. Irked at myself. Shit! How could I be late, today?? I had that crazed “everything relies on right now!” angry surging roaring panic running through my bloodstream, filling my thoughts. I slowed myself down, again and again, facing the panic, facing the inwardly-turned fury. I admitted to myself that I felt disappointed in myself. Angry that maybe – just maybe – it could be self-sabotaging behavior. I stopped for breath. I inhaled deeply. Gave myself time to accept my own humanity. Gave myself a moment of compassion, sympathy, understanding – how human am I? Very. Always have been – and it’s totally okay. I got my things together, and left for work. Feeling humble. Feeling human.

Some journeys are easier than others.

Some journeys are easier than others.

I was waiting for the bus (not my original plan, either), when my Traveling Partner messaged me a good morning, and his supportive reminder that I am enough. It’s just a moment. A small thing. All totally true, and I slowly continued the commute, eventually making it in to the office at about the same time I always do.

Wait, or walk? Today I wait.

Wait, or walk? Today I wait.

The day passed quickly and wasn’t at all what I expected. I’m glad I hadn’t built those expectations up in my head, instead choosing to let go and let the day unfold, doing my best in each moment. The day came and went quickly, and ended more or less the time it generally does. Generally speaking, a good work day. I returned home feeling mostly pretty good.

Now, I’m just relaxing here, in this quiet place, wrapped in comfort, a fire crackling away merrily, and a tasty glass of sherry that I’ve mostly overlooked, just sipping on it now and then, as the hours pass. If I’d stopped to write in that moment this morning, I would not have been able to look ahead to this delicious heady calm.

Right now, right here, it doesn’t matter at all which of the many practices I practice got me from where I was years ago, to where I am now. Yep. It’s taken years. Literal years, many practices, and a lot of verbs, and the journey stretches farther on, and beyond anything I can imagine. Years of practicing. Years of beginning again. So many verbs. Incremental change over time – it happens in increments. It takes time. I’ll keep practicing.

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Categories Anxiety, Brain Injury, Free Will, Mindfulness, Moments, more than a little bit of bitching, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, Relationships, The Art of Being, The Big 5, winter, women, Words

Still Smiling

January 12, 2017 //
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It snowed enough night before last to set the record straight on winter in my area; it’s a thing, and it means business! I worked from home yesterday, and will do so again today. I’m grateful I have that opportunity. The unsteady, swerve-y tracks in the snow report that at least one of my neighbors is not so fortunate. Some people make the choice to brave the poor driving conditions. Some people have to. Some people think they have to. Some people just do.

Eerie pre-dawn sky, on a snowy day.

Eerie pre-dawn sky, on a snowy day.

I had worked out a strategy with coworkers. We planned how to handle the inclement weather together, in advance. It was efficiently done. We’ll do it again that way today, figuring since it worked yesterday, it will therefore work today. As reasoning goes, it’s not the best, but we’re starting there nonetheless. The days in question are different in small ways already… Yesterday, I woke at 4, before my alarm went off. This morning, my alarm drags me from a deep sleep with considerable reluctance, groggy, and struggling to wake. Yesterday, there was no question this was necessary, from the moment the day begin. Today, although our plan seems likely to be well-chosen, I didn’t cross the city personally, yesterday, and don’t realistically know what it might be like to cross it today. The portion of guesswork is larger, although I suspect I will have chosen wisely… It’s hard to be  sure so early. Yesterday, my morning flowed smoothly although I wasn’t set up in advance. This morning, I am completely set up, but I stumble, often. I am having my own experience, and it varies. There’s probably a metaphor buried in all that snow.

I sip my coffee. Some things don’t change. lol

Today is a good day to approach each task with as much care as I did yesterday. Today is a good day to work efficiently, and to take care of this fragile vessel along the way. Today is a good day to give myself my undivided attention, at least now and then. Today is a good day to practice.

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