Finding A Missing Mojo!

Last week I feel in a heap.  All the zip and zing I had in my veins just seeped out overnight.  I was left flat and idle, wishing I knew what to do to get it back...

I did what "they" tell you to do.  I listened to my body.  I slept.  I ate sugar. I took great pains to move despite my lack of enthusiasm.  I didn't eat sugar...  Well none of that helped!  I prompted myself with lists.  I tried to bribe myself into action.  All I got for my efforts was 'blah' and overwhelm.

So yesterday I approached things differently.  

Yesterday I set my goal to do one load of laundry.

While it was in the washing machine I vowed to hang it out when it was done.  

While hanging it out, I decided I'd do one more load.

While it was washing, I decided that I had to fold what I washed so that I had room for the second load on the washing line.  I decided I didn't want to deal with socks and stuffed them in a pile for later.  :-)

As I hung the second load, I decided I'd poke my head into my "games room" and decide on ONE thing I could do in there.  (My games room is a huge source of overwhelm as it is the central collection point for all things 'junk' in my home.  Its chaos.  But I also have high hopes of it becoming my creative space.  :-)  

So my laundry hung I dare to open the door and I decide I can move a crate of stuff out of the corner to make space for something else.  I moved the crate.  Then I left.

I dillydallied for a while.  Then I decided I would re-enter the games room and relocate the item I wanted in the corner.  I did so, then left.

I bathed my children, and while I did so, I decided I would free the fridge from left overs for our dinner!

My day progressed in this manner.  Doing only the next indicated task and making one decision at a time.  Sometimes that decision was a task in itself so I stopped there, knowing that when I had the next little urge or energy fluctuation, I had a plan!  So although by sunset my day was not filled to the brim with amazing achievement, it was not a waste.  My energy was still low but I'd done something despite it. I'd taken one little action after another and another and another. 

My babies went to bed and so did I.  

I woke in the wee hours.  I've been doing this a lot lately.  My brain switches on when I should be sleeping and I lay there thinking about all those "should's" and "haven't yet's" that are on my to do lists.  I start to guilt myself for all the things I "could" be doing instead of trying to sleep, since I'm obviously awake...  

What I usually do is get out of bed, run a lovely hot bath and soak in the tub with my notebook and pen, intending to write lists and 'get myself together'.  But instead I find myself messing about on the iPhone (Yes, I know you shouldn't use your IPhone in the bath, but I do!  :-p) and later, as we get toward sunrise, I begin the mental battle of "do I get out of the bath and study?" or "do I get out of the bath and get some exercise!"  BOTH are pressing issues for me at present.  I've fallen behind (typically) with my study and I have not done nearly enough training for the Step Up For MS challenge that I am signed up for!  

PLEASE SUPPORT ME!

The silly thing is, by the time I've decided what to do, its getting close to the time my kids need to be up for school and I'm TIRED!  So I sneak off to bed for a few minutes rest before the alarm goes off, vowing I'll study and exercise in the afternoon!  WHAT A JOKE!  It never happens.

But this morning when I woke in the wee hours... I didn't fall into the same trap of most mornings.  This morning I applied my method of one decision at a time.  I ran the bath, washed my hair and body and decided I'd play on the phone for a while.  Then I decided I'd read a chapter of my textbook.  Then I decided that I'd read another.  Then I decided to get out and get ready for my day.  :-)

Today was one of those days where things run smoothly.  The kids were dressed and eating breakfast with their shoes on with no effort at all.  So I decided, since I was on a roll of deciding things, to get my dishwasher running.  I decided to start loading the washing machine after that.  I decided to head back to the games room and move one more item to where I want it to be!  By this time it was time to take my boys to school.  

Now by this point, since I will have been awake for several hours, I was losing my puff.  My snuggly bed was calling my name.  But I decided to push through and go to my yoga class.  I'm so glad I did!  When it was over I was energised.  I didn't need to drag myself off to volunteer at the school play group  like I feared I might have to.  In fact I even got into the sandpit and played with the kids for a bit!  We sang and had fruit and when it was done, I walked/JOGGED home.  

And now I'm feeling like I've got it back again...  I've relocated my mojo!  Whooohooo!

I'm not feeling overwhelmed or low on energy now.  I'm feeling productive and inspired to keep doing more!  And I did do more!  I found my son's library book whilst tidying my desk.  He'd left it behind this morning so I walk/jogged to school again to give it to him in time for his class's turn at visiting the library.  :-)  Yay Mama!

I've been thinking...  When you exercise, you reach a point where you're tired or starting to hurt, but you're not at the end of the workout yet.  You just have to go steadily and keep mentally telling yourself you can do it.  Just one more step.  Just one more after that.  And another one.  You can do it! One more lunge, one more step...  Until you're done.  And when you're done you feel amazing!

Well finding my mojo has been just like that.  A whole series of one step after the next. Not focusing on anything else but the next task.  One bite of the elephant at a time. All I had to do was just push on through that difficult patch to get back into the feel good zone!!!

Perfect Neglect

My poor little baby blog... Neglected so soon!  I'm so sorry, sweet one!

LOL

My neglect has not been intentional, I promise!   My neglect is the product of three issues.

ISSUE A
I have too many dreams on the boil and not enough time in the day to focus on them all!

ISSUE B
Life has been crazy busy!  The kiddlywinks are back at school, my husband started a NEW JOB, and we're in a juicy state of chaos!  Hopefully, we'll find a pattern to it all soon and fall into our regular serving of chaos!

ISSUE C
I am a perfectionist!

It is ISSUE C that ALWAYS HOLDS ME BACK!

You know my first post on this blog about not waiting anymore to do what I want to do?  LOL  Well... it still applies!  But the enemy of that attitude for me is PERFECTIONISM!

Now I don't mean the type of perfectionism that is depicted by show home living spaces, straight A grades, every single I dotted, T crossed and manicured nails and salon styled hair each day.  Far from it!

I'm afflicted with the other variety of perfectionism.  The type that can render me motionless - completely imcapacitated from the brain down.  The type that sees me leave things until tomorrow, or when the children go to bed or any other procrastinatory notions! My head will whirr and buzz and I can see and taste and feel what I want to achieve.  BUT...  That big big BUT...

If I can't do it right, first time, there's no point starting at all right now.

Crazy thinking isn't it?  I know it is.

In real terms, it means that if I can't clean a room from skirting boards to cornices, I won't do it right now (at all).  Or if I can't come up with the opening line of an essay, I'll write the whole thing later.  I'll leave a creative idea to fester in the darkness of my mind because I don't know the skills/have the tools/time to bring it to life right now.  I even stagnate on the sofa rather than go for a quick walk to the park because its less than a kilometre and will take me longer to put my shoes on than actually walk!  I tell myself that if its not going to take me at least half an hour and cover at least 3 kilometres, that it is not worth getting off my behind for!

Madness!!!

It drives me crazy!  Fixing a lifelong mindset is hard work!

All I can do is keep on calling myself on the madness and trying to correct it.  I can keep on saying things to myself like "near enough is good enough" and "just get it out there" and "you can't ever get it right if you don't ever get it started".  Sooner or later, I hope, I'll believe those words and never procrastinate over getting it right and done first time ever again! Until then, all I can do is keep on talking over the defective baseline in my noggin.

So issues A and B will sort themselves out over time.  I'm working on lists and setting goals and formulating projects for making things happen.  My family are adjusting to new schedules and jiggling logistics.  That will slot into place soon enough.  But Issue C...  LOL That one needs constant attention.

So there is my excuse for neglecting my baby blog.  It most certainly isn't that I lost interest.  I just haven't been able to write what I wanted, when I wanted to, in a manner that made me feel ok about anyone reading it!  I prefer to settle into inaction when doing things for my family, myself or my friends.  Doing something that is sitting out in the pixellated ether is that much harder!  Its got to be perfect because "someone" might read it, right?

The fear of judgment.  (Another topic for another day perhaps?)

Well someone might read it.  And if they like it they'll keep reading and the message, as imprecise, grammatically malfunctioned and lacking in finesse, will (hopefully) get through.  And if not, WHO CARES!  Really?  There are a zillion other blogs out there to go read!

What really matters most, to me, is that I will have gotten what's on my mind, out into the open.  I'll be set free from it buzzing inside my cranium.  I'll be rewarded with knowing that I did something perfectly imperfect.

Thumbing my nose at perfectionism & procrastination!
"You both lost this round!" :-p

love
Penny

Lessons from Every Day Rituals.

Inspiration can come from anywhere!

Today, for me, it came from a blog post, penned by the gorgeous Silvia De Vries and published by the  magnificent Pepi Valderrama on her blog.  The article was entitled The Healing Rituals of Everyday Life.

Silvia suggested an exercise in mindfulness, by either writing down or photographing every day activities.  The idea caught my attention as I've been endeavouring to be more present recently.  Simply trying to pay attention to the here and now, rather than existing and missing the beauty of the moment, whilst letting my mind wander aimlessly to the past and future with it's endless to-do list

So, I took on the challenge.

I learned an awful lot about myself, my home, my family...  Some wonderful things.  Some that surprised me.  And some, that unfortunately I'm not happy to learn!  But now that I have, I can work on  righting the wrongs, as I feel them to be.

Here is an account of my day in photographs.

So what did I learn?

• HOUSEHOLD: I have WAY TOO MUCH laundry!  But I got on top of it simply because I was being mindful to document my progress throughout the day.  

• HOUSEHOLD: Taking photographs of every day activities made me very aware of what I need to tidy up around my home!  As I went to take pictures, I'd think to myself, "Ugh, don't want that in the background!"  So now I have a mental list of to-do's to add to the already on paper list of to-do's.

• PHOTOGRAPHY: As a consequence of the above, I began working on camera angles that did not highlight what I prefer not to be seen...  Call me sneaky - I don't mind! :-)

• SELF CARE: I forget to eat!  And when I do remember to eat, I was so consumed by the process of eating, I forgot to take pictures of those moments.  You missed out on the awesome lasagne we had for dinner tonight!  Sorry!  And no, they are not sticks in my yogurt!  They are some kind of fibre crunchy thing that is actually quite tasty!

• TIME MANAGEMENT: Even though I was being mindful of my every day activities, I still 'lost' an awful lot of time during my day.  You know, those moments where we get to surfing the web for an answer to a question that should take 5 minutes at most, but ends up taking us three quarts of an hour!  Oops!  Or when you sit down for a rest and suddenly half an hour has passed.

• SELF CARE: Cat naps in the day time are fabulous!  I managed about 20 minutes and felt so much better for it!

• FAMILY: My dog is lazy!  Except when I forget to feed her.  She reminded me as I was putting the children to bed!

• FAMILY: My oldest son has a loose tooth!  Exciting!  

It was a wonderful exercise to do.  It kept me on task for much of the day and I achieved a lot.  Possibly more than I usually would.  But I'm also left with the awareness that I could have achieved a lot more!  

Oddly enough while I was folding my laundry today, I listened to a podcast talking about making the best use of your weekends (or any free time).  It wasn't planned.  I just picked something to listen to from my podcasts and that's what came up.  Nothing like a bit of synchronicity to hone in a concept!  You can find the podcast here.  The podcast is by Kimberly Wilson and is an interview of Laura Vanderkam, author of the What The Most Successful People do series of ebooks.  

Tomorrow is another day...  I'm taking my lessons from today and running with them!

Miraculous Change

Something significant has happened...

I'm awake!  The sun is so beautiful and warm.   It hangs in an intensely blue sky.  The breeze is exhilarating and ready to carry me away on my sparkling dream wings...  I'm filled to overflowing with energy and eagerness to FLY!

I've been waiting too long.  I have been waiting for the time to be right, the circumstances to be different.  I've been waiting for permission from others, or from myself.  I've been waiting to change, or for others to change.  I have been waiting for luck, perfection, inspiration - something!  I've been waiting for the fear to go away so I can follow what's in my heart.  I've been waiting for 'one day'.  It feels like I have been waiting for an eternity...

The truth is, what I've been waiting for MIGHT happen if I wait long enough for it.  But, it just might not too.

And what of the time that passes while I wait?  What joy is there in existing?

It comes, it goes. It merges into the grey of each day. It is there...  Its just not as vibrant and all-consuming as it 'should' be.

The past few weeks have brought me change.  Not the change I'd been anticipating.  But change nonetheless.  I've been dealt curve balls from left field.  Things that have shaken my core, challenged me, frightened me, brought me deep sadness.  But ultimately, this change has jolted me to reality.

The miracle here is that the reality I'm in is incredibly exciting, as opposed to the reality that could have been.  The reality I've habitually fallen into in the past when life deals lemons.   Those curve balls could just as easily have sent me into depression, to anger, to wither in fear...  This time, they have not!

I'd be lying if I said those negative emotions didn't cross my path.  But they did not stay with me long.  I most certainly felt them.  I've ached, I've cried, I have hidden them from myself and others, I've had tantrums, the whole gamut.  All of the negative emotion has washed over me.  I realise that I probably will feel them all again, because healing is a process.  It does not just happen.  But I've been blessed this time with the overwhelming miracle of feeling compassion and a sense of what really matters.  I've been filled up with passion to go out and make my dreams into my reality.  Those positive emotions are anchored deeply this time.  They feel like they belong to me and won't be fleeting.

 I've been given freedom to not wait anymore.