Lately I've been doing a lot of thinking about how busy my life has become. I keep thinking, "Oh, after this I'll have some free time," or "Oh, once this passes I can do x, y, z."
You know what? I don't think that time is ever going to come. That really is just dawning on me in a real way.
Which means I'm going to have to learn to adapt and learn that I'm not going to be able to do everything, and that I can't judge my relative success or failure in life by the number of Yeses and Nos that I have to give people when they ask me for something--no matter how badly I want to do something.
It also means I have to prioritize. I don't like the word prioritize. it seems to suggest that some things can be truly counted as more important than others. I'm always afraid I'm going to hurt someone's feelings or let someone down. And saying "Oh, this doesn't fit on the priority list" seems like the coldest thing ever, even if I'm just saying it to myself.
And that means I have to make sure to schedule in time to spend with my husband that's not just the daily living-together stuff that any cohabitators would have. Same goes for my dog, my family, and ... myself.
It means not overcommitting so that I feel consistently overwhelmed on a weekly basis. And consistently frustrated and feeling like I failed when the to-do list spills over from week to week, month to month.
We all need time to be creative and daydream or blow off steam. It makes us more productive and happy in the long run. I wonder how long it will take me to truly take this advice for myself, no matter how much I believe it for other people.
Showing posts with label challenges. Show all posts
Showing posts with label challenges. Show all posts
Tuesday, November 3, 2009
Monday, October 26, 2009
The only true currency in this bankrupt world is what we share with someone when we're uncool.
I have never been cool.
I am not sleek, subtle, cool-as-a-cucumber cool, mysterious, secretive. None of that.
No, no, I am more like the golden retriever running in circles, slobbering all over you with my melodramatic chatty-chat and panic this and quasi-crisis that. I am not the person in the corner at the party, quietly sipping on a drink and looking bemused—the person people wonder about—because I pretty much can't hold myself back from putting it all out there.
I've never really wanted to be that cool person, either.
Whenever I've attempted any semblance of being cool, I've fallen flat on my face. Whenever I become too conscious of my writing process, I feel like it shows. When I just go about my life, I find that I have kind friends, supportive family, and my knight in shining armor. When I just write for writing's sake, write to share, write to breathe, I find I do my best writing.
Philip Glass said in his fascinating documentary on PBS that he doesn't really "think up" music. Rather, it's this rhythmic current that runs underneath everything, below in the subconscious, and he's tuned his ear to dip into the water and express it.
That's the first time that another person has articulated my process. I never had the words to explain it before. I almost fell off the couch. How could I have the same process, the same feeling about creation as a FLIPPING MUSICAL GENIUS? I'm not comparing my talent level to his, but suddenly I felt like a had a kindred spirit. Have you seen Philip Glass? He's not cool, either.
When I write, I have hot and cold spots like the springs in the lake my parents' cabin sits on. Sometimes life presents me with rich material. Sometimes it doesn't. The art is to take the everyday and elevate it; after all, that everyday is what people understand.
I won't ever be cool. I am my own stumbling block. I need to get out of my way, be me, and just write. And by that process, maybe something cool will happen.
I am not sleek, subtle, cool-as-a-cucumber cool, mysterious, secretive. None of that.
No, no, I am more like the golden retriever running in circles, slobbering all over you with my melodramatic chatty-chat and panic this and quasi-crisis that. I am not the person in the corner at the party, quietly sipping on a drink and looking bemused—the person people wonder about—because I pretty much can't hold myself back from putting it all out there.
I've never really wanted to be that cool person, either.
Whenever I've attempted any semblance of being cool, I've fallen flat on my face. Whenever I become too conscious of my writing process, I feel like it shows. When I just go about my life, I find that I have kind friends, supportive family, and my knight in shining armor. When I just write for writing's sake, write to share, write to breathe, I find I do my best writing.
Philip Glass said in his fascinating documentary on PBS that he doesn't really "think up" music. Rather, it's this rhythmic current that runs underneath everything, below in the subconscious, and he's tuned his ear to dip into the water and express it.
That's the first time that another person has articulated my process. I never had the words to explain it before. I almost fell off the couch. How could I have the same process, the same feeling about creation as a FLIPPING MUSICAL GENIUS? I'm not comparing my talent level to his, but suddenly I felt like a had a kindred spirit. Have you seen Philip Glass? He's not cool, either.
When I write, I have hot and cold spots like the springs in the lake my parents' cabin sits on. Sometimes life presents me with rich material. Sometimes it doesn't. The art is to take the everyday and elevate it; after all, that everyday is what people understand.
I won't ever be cool. I am my own stumbling block. I need to get out of my way, be me, and just write. And by that process, maybe something cool will happen.
Monday, September 28, 2009
Falling
Yesterday, I went in the mall with one of my BFFs, the friend I've had the absolute longest, who happens to be leaving the country in three weeks to teach English for six months. (I will then lack a best friend that lives in the state, my little tri-shaped cocoon broken up by geography.)
When we came back out of the mall a couple of hours later, the temperature had dropped a good 10 to 15 degrees. The wind was blowing, and the sky looked menacing. The thin hoodie and yoga pants I was wearing (yeah, I really care about my appearance lately) were not enough, and we ran for the car, giggling about how she wasn't going to miss the cold winter. I told her that no one else runs screaming to the car like we do when it's cold...so now I'm just going to look insane when I do it by myself.
Again, today was dark and cloudy and threatened rain. It was a long, swirling ball of stress and more-than-intermittent frustration, running here and there, my patience (never known for its long fuse) shorter than usual.
Suddenly, friend-adventures abound in my life; babies (my GOD the babies; what water all are these women drinking? I think I now roundabouts 20 people who are pregnant or gave birth this year), weddings (again, around 20 people), travel, blazing new pathways through our quasi-adulthood. Seasons are changing.
I'm so, so excited for all these people and their wonderful news. Seriously, I love getting the news that someone's engaged or pregnant or off to fulfill a life dream, and I get super crabby when people aren't supportive of everyone's good fortunes. I've noticed lately that there's a lack of genuine excitement for other people and I'm working hard to combat that jealous force all by myself, if I have to. And their good newses end up cheering my OWN moods, and I rely on them when I'm feeling like the world is tipping off its axis just a little bit.
But still. It forces me to evaluate my own life. I'm struggling to find my next adventures, my own life path, my own dreams, whatever they may be. But that doesn't change my happiness or excitement for everyone else--hell, if they pursue their dreams, it inspires me to do the same.
I have to say that tonight, as I walked through the door after an extralong day, those fall clouds parted a little upon seeing my darling husband chopping garlic for our dinner.
When we came back out of the mall a couple of hours later, the temperature had dropped a good 10 to 15 degrees. The wind was blowing, and the sky looked menacing. The thin hoodie and yoga pants I was wearing (yeah, I really care about my appearance lately) were not enough, and we ran for the car, giggling about how she wasn't going to miss the cold winter. I told her that no one else runs screaming to the car like we do when it's cold...so now I'm just going to look insane when I do it by myself.
Again, today was dark and cloudy and threatened rain. It was a long, swirling ball of stress and more-than-intermittent frustration, running here and there, my patience (never known for its long fuse) shorter than usual.
Suddenly, friend-adventures abound in my life; babies (my GOD the babies; what water all are these women drinking? I think I now roundabouts 20 people who are pregnant or gave birth this year), weddings (again, around 20 people), travel, blazing new pathways through our quasi-adulthood. Seasons are changing.
I'm so, so excited for all these people and their wonderful news. Seriously, I love getting the news that someone's engaged or pregnant or off to fulfill a life dream, and I get super crabby when people aren't supportive of everyone's good fortunes. I've noticed lately that there's a lack of genuine excitement for other people and I'm working hard to combat that jealous force all by myself, if I have to. And their good newses end up cheering my OWN moods, and I rely on them when I'm feeling like the world is tipping off its axis just a little bit.
But still. It forces me to evaluate my own life. I'm struggling to find my next adventures, my own life path, my own dreams, whatever they may be. But that doesn't change my happiness or excitement for everyone else--hell, if they pursue their dreams, it inspires me to do the same.
I have to say that tonight, as I walked through the door after an extralong day, those fall clouds parted a little upon seeing my darling husband chopping garlic for our dinner.
Tuesday, August 4, 2009
Recommitting to the Intention
Lying on the floor on a rubber mat, breathing deeply, and emptying out the contents of my brain. Reverse thinking. No doing, besides breathing and letting go.
Then, suddenly, I sweep my arms over my head and stretch from the tips of my fingers to the tops of my toes. Arch up and bridge out, raising and lowering my arms and spine as I breathe in and out and find my zone.
Heart beating a little faster, standing now, sweeping arms up overhead, now bending in half, suddenly pushing a leg back to a lunge, palms pushing against the floor, now the dreaded plank, and we freeze, holding ourselves up, the beginning of a pushup. Now, lower, and halfway up into Cobra, then Up Dog, now curling toes under, pushing sitting bones up, blood rushing as I hang my head and hold it, breathing, waiting for the next gentle suggestion.
Shaking it out, pushing into Crescent, arms overhead, pivoting, Warrior one, two, three, my thighs are burning, but as I hinge forward that my back lays flatter (though not yet as flat as I'd like), and I am touching the floor with certainty, not grazing with fingertips, not hovering six inches above the floor. Boat pose, leaning back but not relaxing now, no, shaking, a thin sheen developing over my whole body.
Hip flexors, calves, lower back, relaxing the shoulders down, rolling the neck, tipping the head back, spine crackling.
Every Tuesday night, my yoga instructor asks us to commit to our intention. It can be a simple one. No lofty goals needed in an hour of yoga, a nice reminder to someone like me, someone as flexible as a two-by-four.
I commit. I commit. I commit to each pose because I want to be healthier, more flexible; my stomach likes it, I can tell. I commit to letting go of the day, of the six days leading up to this hour. I forget it. I indulge, and I work at it.
I will likely never be able to sing or play piano, despite my deep wishes, or paint a beautiful portrait, or change the world, or win a Pulitzer or Booker prize. But for one hour, I can commit to breathing. Just breathing.
I need to commit to writing. I relax into it, but at the same time, if I'm serious, I have to work at it, invent synapses, create bridges, reach out through my whole body, exercise vocabulary, strengthen my mental reserve, push myself to the limit. I have to commit. Instead of my fingers finding the floor, they find the keys, and hopefully, eventually, they are skyward, and I am saying, even if I'm shaking, finally. I'm where I want to be.
As my yoga instructor reminds us each week: If you could call it perfection, what would it look like, feel like, be like? In this moment, call it perfection, and know that it is enough.
Then, suddenly, I sweep my arms over my head and stretch from the tips of my fingers to the tops of my toes. Arch up and bridge out, raising and lowering my arms and spine as I breathe in and out and find my zone.
Heart beating a little faster, standing now, sweeping arms up overhead, now bending in half, suddenly pushing a leg back to a lunge, palms pushing against the floor, now the dreaded plank, and we freeze, holding ourselves up, the beginning of a pushup. Now, lower, and halfway up into Cobra, then Up Dog, now curling toes under, pushing sitting bones up, blood rushing as I hang my head and hold it, breathing, waiting for the next gentle suggestion.
Shaking it out, pushing into Crescent, arms overhead, pivoting, Warrior one, two, three, my thighs are burning, but as I hinge forward that my back lays flatter (though not yet as flat as I'd like), and I am touching the floor with certainty, not grazing with fingertips, not hovering six inches above the floor. Boat pose, leaning back but not relaxing now, no, shaking, a thin sheen developing over my whole body.
Hip flexors, calves, lower back, relaxing the shoulders down, rolling the neck, tipping the head back, spine crackling.
Every Tuesday night, my yoga instructor asks us to commit to our intention. It can be a simple one. No lofty goals needed in an hour of yoga, a nice reminder to someone like me, someone as flexible as a two-by-four.
I commit. I commit. I commit to each pose because I want to be healthier, more flexible; my stomach likes it, I can tell. I commit to letting go of the day, of the six days leading up to this hour. I forget it. I indulge, and I work at it.
I will likely never be able to sing or play piano, despite my deep wishes, or paint a beautiful portrait, or change the world, or win a Pulitzer or Booker prize. But for one hour, I can commit to breathing. Just breathing.
I need to commit to writing. I relax into it, but at the same time, if I'm serious, I have to work at it, invent synapses, create bridges, reach out through my whole body, exercise vocabulary, strengthen my mental reserve, push myself to the limit. I have to commit. Instead of my fingers finding the floor, they find the keys, and hopefully, eventually, they are skyward, and I am saying, even if I'm shaking, finally. I'm where I want to be.
As my yoga instructor reminds us each week: If you could call it perfection, what would it look like, feel like, be like? In this moment, call it perfection, and know that it is enough.
Wednesday, April 30, 2008
Sleepless in St. Paul
Please, Sleep, wherever you are, please come back to me.
Spending time on hold for unemployment screwups is not my idea of a good time; especially when my payments are getting delayed and I'm sleep deprived.
Working on tiny details and remembering every little thing for everything I have to do in the next two weeks: not easy when sleep deprived.
Bah.
Spending time on hold for unemployment screwups is not my idea of a good time; especially when my payments are getting delayed and I'm sleep deprived.
Working on tiny details and remembering every little thing for everything I have to do in the next two weeks: not easy when sleep deprived.
Bah.
Monday, August 27, 2007
writing it all down
i'm starting this thing where i'd like to be writing here every day. even if it's a short entry.
william's grandma and grandpa hung calendars on their wall and recorded details of days' events, even if it was just the temperature and the amount of fish they caught. and now they have like fifty years of days where they can look back. their own farmers' almanac. something, that i'm sure will be much sweeter for their relatives to look at and remember.
back in the day, i blogged anonymously, and after a while, it was sometimes up in the two-to-four entries a day category. not all of them were good, but it was good exercise, good therapy, good practice. and now i look back and there are definitely moments there that i wouldn't remember if not for my writing. which is sad, because some things are so joyful, some are so awful... how could i forget? of course, that was anonymous blogging, and so the nature of the blogs change once you know that a)people are actually reading you, and b) that you might be writing about life experiences that might affect them--those that you know and love. that's ok though. sometimes i get afraid my memory is getting worse, which upsets me further when i think about that two of my favorite people in the whole world died from illnesses that eventually completely erased their memories and reprogrammed them with incorrect ones.
memories aren't accurate anyway. and when we write about them, i've learned, we are, in a way, cannabalizing our own memory, just like how when you play a game of telephone the words change. it's better than letting all those things get buried.
i just read one of my favorite blogs, from the back nine, and she reveals her mom's diary pages, which were often just four or five fragmented sentences that bring floods of memories back for her. or even small insights into her mother in a way she wouldn' t have understood at the time. (here i'm just conjecturing--i just feel i might be able to get that somewhere down the line).
in any case, the challenge is on for myself. i need to do more writing, be more creative, nurture that. i do love blogging, i do love writing, and therefore, i should do more of it. your comments and emails egg me on further. thanks for those. keep them coming.
ok, so on the list today besides that:
i hate money. hate it, hate it, hate it. i have to get better at managing it (although i've come a long way already, i still have a ways to go). i also need to actively seek out some freelance jobs because i need some extra cash lately. weddings! expensive! no matter how you cut it! plus a girl needs some fall work clothes, and stat. well, sort of stat. it's still august, i know.
also. i need to find some ways to focus all my nervous and bad energies. i would like to, besides write more, which often helps... work out. i know. i hate working out. i think i hate it more than the average person. but i'm getting to an age... agh... where i think my metabolism is slowing down. and no, i'm not heavy by any means, but i am out of shape and getting not toned and i'm stressed out all the time and it's good for me anyway, so i should find a way to do it, even when i'm tired and want to veg (which is all the time), and find something that's marginally fun. i think yoga and pilates would be perfect for my energy and frustration problems, but i also need to take brisk walks, do some resistance training, and maybe get some tennis in (i do so love tennis). but it's a lack of time and ... will power, i guess.
william is right now watching a show called fat march. he says "you can't even make that shit up!" is that why i'm thinking about this?
william's grandma and grandpa hung calendars on their wall and recorded details of days' events, even if it was just the temperature and the amount of fish they caught. and now they have like fifty years of days where they can look back. their own farmers' almanac. something, that i'm sure will be much sweeter for their relatives to look at and remember.
back in the day, i blogged anonymously, and after a while, it was sometimes up in the two-to-four entries a day category. not all of them were good, but it was good exercise, good therapy, good practice. and now i look back and there are definitely moments there that i wouldn't remember if not for my writing. which is sad, because some things are so joyful, some are so awful... how could i forget? of course, that was anonymous blogging, and so the nature of the blogs change once you know that a)people are actually reading you, and b) that you might be writing about life experiences that might affect them--those that you know and love. that's ok though. sometimes i get afraid my memory is getting worse, which upsets me further when i think about that two of my favorite people in the whole world died from illnesses that eventually completely erased their memories and reprogrammed them with incorrect ones.
memories aren't accurate anyway. and when we write about them, i've learned, we are, in a way, cannabalizing our own memory, just like how when you play a game of telephone the words change. it's better than letting all those things get buried.
i just read one of my favorite blogs, from the back nine, and she reveals her mom's diary pages, which were often just four or five fragmented sentences that bring floods of memories back for her. or even small insights into her mother in a way she wouldn' t have understood at the time. (here i'm just conjecturing--i just feel i might be able to get that somewhere down the line).
in any case, the challenge is on for myself. i need to do more writing, be more creative, nurture that. i do love blogging, i do love writing, and therefore, i should do more of it. your comments and emails egg me on further. thanks for those. keep them coming.
ok, so on the list today besides that:
i hate money. hate it, hate it, hate it. i have to get better at managing it (although i've come a long way already, i still have a ways to go). i also need to actively seek out some freelance jobs because i need some extra cash lately. weddings! expensive! no matter how you cut it! plus a girl needs some fall work clothes, and stat. well, sort of stat. it's still august, i know.
also. i need to find some ways to focus all my nervous and bad energies. i would like to, besides write more, which often helps... work out. i know. i hate working out. i think i hate it more than the average person. but i'm getting to an age... agh... where i think my metabolism is slowing down. and no, i'm not heavy by any means, but i am out of shape and getting not toned and i'm stressed out all the time and it's good for me anyway, so i should find a way to do it, even when i'm tired and want to veg (which is all the time), and find something that's marginally fun. i think yoga and pilates would be perfect for my energy and frustration problems, but i also need to take brisk walks, do some resistance training, and maybe get some tennis in (i do so love tennis). but it's a lack of time and ... will power, i guess.
william is right now watching a show called fat march. he says "you can't even make that shit up!" is that why i'm thinking about this?
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)