(im)perfection

This week is Book Week. Juniordwarf’s school is having a Book Week Parade and the kids are all encouraged to dress up as a character from their favourite book.
 

Two years ago he wanted to be The Very Hungry Caterpillar, and I did this.

Last year he was a pirate, which was easy because he already had a pirate costume.

This year he said he wanted to be The Cat In The Hat. 

I figured this wouldn’t be too hard, and set about planning how I was going to do this

I always thought one of he fun things about primary school-age kids would be doing stuff like making costumes. You know, in all that spare time I have. Yeah.

I can remember my mother making me a Wild Thing costume in primary school for something our class was doing around the book Where The Wild Things Are.

(It looked like this:)

I assume I could actually breathe in this outfit

I figured if my mother could create such a thing out of an old blanket, I could come up with a cat costume pretty easily. Black pants, a black and white top, a tail and OH MY GOODNESS HOW THE HELL DO YOU MAKE HATS?

(Luckily a nearby craft supply store just happened to stock red and white striped hats exactly like the one the Cat in the Hat wears, which I discovered when I went in to get my supplies for this crafty endeavour. Enormous relief.)

I got out the sewing machine. Yes the very same sewing machine I got for Xmas two years ago and had not actually used. The same sewing machine listed at Number 24 on my 100 things to do in 2013 list (24. Sew something. Anything. Just use the damn sewing machine!).

Once I worked out how to thread it (which could be a whole post in itself – my mother’s old basic Bernina it is not), it was time for action.

The black pants were going to be easy. I based them on the same pattern I used for the caterpillar costume. 

OK, not quite so easy. Fluffy polar fleece isn’t quite as easy to sew as I thought it would be. I mean, it moves when you sew it. What kind of sorcery is this?

Anyway, I got there eventually. The pants were done. I’m totally rocking this crafty mama thing.

I didn’t have any sweatshirt patterns. No drama. How hard can it be? It’s just four pieces right? A front, a back and two sleeves. So I can just trace one of his sweatshirts and copy that.

Seam allowance? Pfft, who needs that? It’s a cat outfit. It’s meant to be tight.

 

See, it fits him.

Oh, you know what? You should have sewed the sleeves into the shoulders before you sewed up the side seams.

Well I’ll just trace the top of the sleeve using the arm hole as a guide, extend it to the length of his arm, and narrow it in at the bottom. Then I can just sew the sleeve in to the arm hole. No worries.

NO WORRIES? WHAT, ARE YOU KIDDING? HAVE A LOOK AT THIS! THE SLEEVES AREN’T WIDE ENOUGH! WHATEVER HAPPENED TO “MEASURE TWICE, CUT ONCE?”

True. In most garments the sleeves actually join up under the arm. 

Bugger.

By this time I was getting somewhat frustrated at this whole exercise. Who said the crafty mama thing was fun? I actually wanted to do this? What was I thinking?

Juniordwarf was watching me. “So I don’t think this is going to be a very good costume,” I said to him.

He looked at me.

Then said, “I don’t mind. It doesn’t have to be perfect. In fact, I don’t want it to be perfect.”

I thought back to where I’d heard this before. It had come from Juniordwarf’s teacher. His class is doing Art this term, and the teacher has been stressing the point very strongly that their art doesn’t have to be perfect and it doesn’t matter if it doesn’t look exactly like what they’re drawing and painting or if it doesn’t look the same as anyone else’s work. The idea is to capture what they see and reproduce it the way they see it themselves – so how one child sees something and draws it will be different to how any other child sees it.

The displays around the classroom are testament to this, and it’s fascinating to see each child’s style in their work.

While I was thinking about this, Juniordwarf then proceeded to quote what I’ve often said to him, right back at me. “It doesn’t matter if you make a mistake. We all make mistakes. Mistakes are how we learn.”

 

And you know what struck me most? That while I’m encouraging him not to be hard on himself and not set himself impossible standards, I continue to expect myself to be perfect and to never make a mistake.

It’s not going to be enough for him to hear these messages is it? I can’t really tell him not to seek perfection if I continue to expect it of myself. He’ll catch on to that one day, and how am I going to explain that? 

“Well . . . it’s OK for you not to do things perfectly, but I’m different. I have to.” 

Not really convincing is it? I’m not different. 

So for him to truly embrace these messages, he has to see them in action. That means he has to see me make mistakes and see how I learn from them. He has to see me accept less than perfect. He has to know that I believe what I’m saying. And therefore, I have to believe it.

Maybe I should go back to Grade 1. 

(P.S. Costume is not quite finished . . . but it will fit him and I expect it will hold together for a day. So all is well.)

and so, this self-care thing is hard

After yesterday's post about how I'm not looking after myself (I'm starting to sound like that frozen meals ad, yeah?) I got a lot of supportive comments from my friends, both real life and online. I felt very touched that people were concerned about me.

They all said pretty much the same thing. I have to take better care of myself or I'm not going to be any good to anyone.

I know in my heart of hearts that this is true. Or at least Me-two does. Me-first (or perhaps that part of me should be called Everyone-else-first) is somewhat reluctant to accept it, and thinks that I need to keep going until the job is done, without any let up. And then keep going some more.

It's going to be difficult to overcome Me-first's drive and determination, especially when she is in the 'zone'. But I need to find a better balance and I need to give Me-two what she needs as well.

Today I didn't do very well at this.

But tomorrow is another day and I will try again. Some things I need to really pay attention to first are to have a proper lunch break and regular breaks during the day, to drink more water and less beer, and to get a massage.

One thing I'm quite proud of is that I haven't resorted to stress eating or going back to cakes and sweet things. That's an area I think I've made a lot of progress in.

So if I can do that, there's no reason why I can't take other steps as well. And one step at a time I will get to where I want to be.

And thank you everyone who sent me supportive messages. I appreciate you taking the time for me.

the conflict within

The last few weeks I've felt like I'm two different people.

I'm very busy at work and the end date is rapidly approaching. Things need to be done yesterday and somehow, the two elements of the project that I'm responsible for have both ended up needing to be finalised at pretty much the same time.

I'm struggling, because it's been very much: do this, send it back, next thing comes in while I'm doing the first thing, do the second thing, send that back, in the mean time the third thing has come in, then the first thing has come back and needs revision . . . and it doesn't seem to stop.

Me-first is driven and determined to get this all done, and done right, and won't stop until everything is perfect. My part-time hours mean I haven't been there at some critical times, which means delays that I can't really afford. The days I'm supposed to leave at 2.30 to pick up Juniordwarf from school have been the hardest. Just because I've left doesn't mean the work doesn't keep coming in. So I've been taking work home to make up those hours.

Taking work home is something I said I'd never do, but Me-first is taking some kind of delight in working so hard and getting things finished. It must be the adrenaline rush or something, because Me-first has really been getting into the zone at these times. Working at home has become such a habit that last Wednesday, the first Wednesday for a few weeks that I didn't need to take anything home, I was wandering round the house feeling completely lost because I didn't have any work to do. 

I know!  That has to be the saddest thing ever, right?

The second me is feeling very very pressured and scared and overwhelmed and like I'm about to hit my breaking point. Me-two hears people tell me to ease up on myself, to relax and to take time for myself. Me-two knows that I need to do this, but Me-first is committed to the task and says that there is no time to stop now, I can rest when this is all over. It won't be too much longer, it really won't, and the pressure will be off.

So this inner dialogue between Me-two and Me-first is going on all the time, making me feel even more anxious. So now, not only am I feeling stressed about the work itself, which is bad enough, but I'm also feeling stressed about the very fact that I’m overdoing it. I think I'm just holding on by the skin of my teeth, so that I can have this break some time in the near future. At which point I will probably collapse.

Me-first decided to make things worse yesterday when Juniordwarf and I were watching a DVD, by telling me I really should be doing something more productive with my time with him rather than watching a DVD or letting him go on the computer. 

Thank you Me-first. That is Not Helpful.

I think part of this stems from the way I think about myself at work - or more accurately, the way I think other people see me at work - that is, that being part-time means I don't really pull my weight. So Me-first is determined to show them that I can contribute just as well as anyone else and not let the side down. Everyone else is under pressure too. Others are working full-time hours, some of them have kids too and they’re all coping. I just waltz on out of there at 3 pm, so what do I have to complain about?

Of course, no one has ever said that they think I’m slacking off because I’m part-time, and the majority of feedback I have received is that my contributions are valued and that being part-time hasn't affected my work performance. Some things might take longer for me to do because I'm not there all day, but this is generally factored into my time frames.

So it's a flawed argument, but it doesn't stop me feeling guilty every time I leave work at school pickup time. 

It would be easy enough for me to lay all the blame for this on work, but that’s unfair. When I took on the extra work, I expected it to be a lot less work than it became. I've been fairly relaxed about waiting for other people’s feedback and contributions – someone told me I was far too nice in this regard – and I don’t like to ask for what I need even if, by failing to do so, I inconvenience myself. I’d rather put myself out than someone else. It takes me quite a while to settle into the flow of a project and get really focused. And I’m a very good procrastinator.

Fingers crossed that the worst of this is now over. There is still more work to be done, but I’m quietly confident that the craziness that was the last few weeks has passed. And what I have to do once all this is over is to make an effort to sit down, not in judgement of myself, but in a self-compassionate sort of way, and work out where I went wrong and come up with ways I can learn from this.

I also need to take some time off. I think a week away somewhere in the mountains with no phone, no internet, a stack of books, pens and paper and some yoga DVDs would be just what I need right now.

Me-two is nodding furiously.

quitting sugar - week 1

 

I survived Week 1 of my quitting sugar experiment and I’m keen to continue.

My aim for last week was to avoid sweet treats like cakes and lollies. My main problem was snacking on lollies and cakes after lunch – either picking up something on the way back to the office, a sneaky trip to the vending machine or sometimes, for a special indulgence, a visit to the bakery for a peppermint slice with my afternoon coffee.

This was a habit that had crept up on me recently and last time I let it continue for any length of time, I ended up being the heaviest I’d ever been, this time 12 months ago. So, regardless of anything else, this was a habit that had to be brought under control.

Week 1 wasn’t too bad. Some of the things I noticed were:

• my morning berry and banana smoothie tasted incredibly sweet, which I’d not noticed before. I’ve cut out the banana and am experimenting with substitutes. This will be important if I get to the stage where all fruit is cut out.
• not having a sweet snack in the afternoon made no difference to my post-lunch afternoon energy slumps. I need to investigate this more and possibly tweak what I have for lunch.
• I got more frequent headaches, mostly in the afternoon and evening. Yesterday’s was the worst and the longest lasting.

Although there were times I felt miserable, I didn’t always feel like I needed to cheer myself up with something sweet and when I did, I didn't have anything. I also avoided eating cakes and lollies that people offered me, TWICE! without making a fuss about it, which I was particularly happy with.

Juniordwarf had got some lollies from a trip to the lolly shop with his grandmother (I have to start working on her now . . . ) and he offered to share them with me. I was delighted at his sharing attitude but had to decline, telling him that I didn’t eat lollies any more. He seemed to accept that as something people do. 

Week 2 is going to be more of the same. I’m also going to start paying more attention to food with added sugar and start to cut that out as much as possible.

One thing I noticed when reading food labels is that the food that contains a lot of sugar also includes other highly processed ingredients that I don’t really want to be eating, like hydrogenated oils. So this sugar-free thing is also going to be a big step towards my goal of making sure my diet consists, as far as possible, of unprocessed or minimally processed food.

At this stage I don’t know if complete elimination of sugar (or for the purpose of this experiment, fructose) is necessary. There are arguments and counter-arguments and more counter-arguments, and there is a lot of information out there and a lot of questions. Is it the elimination of sugar that has improved people’s health, or is it the general improvement in diet due to removing a lot of highly processed foods? Do those people who benefit most from a completely sugar-free diet have an intolerance to fructose that the people who don’t benefit don’t have? 

What I’m doing is trying to find out how my body reacts to elimination of sugar (fructose) and then re-introduce small amounts of sugar in its natural state (fruit, for example) and see what happens. (As I understand it complete elimination is virtually impossible, but that foods with a higher proportion of fructose to glucose that can cause problems.)

It’s early days and, as I said last week, I’m keeping an open mind and trying it to see if it has any effect on me. 

So far, the effects have been headaches and, if my bathroom scales can be relied on, one kilo lost.

organising the 100 things

A few days after I wrote my list of 100 things to do in 2013 I went back over it to work out exactly how and when I'm going to do all those things.

It occurred to me that I could look at the list in several different ways.

There were lots of things that related to improving my health, and lots about getting organised and staying on top of things. There were things I could group as (for lack of a better term) sorting my head out, others about keeping records of my life, exploring my world, creating, gardening, doing stuff with my family . . . and the categories go on.

Some of the things I want to do are one-off jobs. Do them and they are crossed off the list. Others are habits I want to get into over the year and others are multi-step projects.

So I spent a bit of time this week sorting the list. Because, despite outward appearances, I like things to be in order and logically sequenced. It doesn't mean I do them. It's most likely a procrastination tool that stops me getting things done. But that's another story.

Anyway, I thought that a lot of what I want to do could be worked into a resolution (or commitment) chart, which I first came across when I read Gretchen Rubin's book The Happiness Project.

I picked out a couple of things that I wanted to start doing every day (the "habits" from the list) and have made an all new chart for 2013 in an attempt to keep on top of things. The idea is that once I've started to make the first couple of things into habits that I actually do, I'll gradually add in some more things from the list so that by the end of the year I will have all the new habits I want to develop. Or at least some of them.

It's a bit more structured than what I'm used to, especially for my personal life. But I've felt very unsettled ever since we started the moving house journey back in July, and I feel like I need some structure so that I can get back some control over my life.

And, just so this isn't an entirely photo-free post, last night I started work on my One Little Word project. I cut, I stamped, I washi taped and I bradded (if that's an actual word). I also managed to drip my stamp cleaner fluid into one of my ink pads, which I don't think is particularly good for the ink pad.

Also, this is what happens when you give your six-year-old your phone.

Happiness is not a destination

When walking past a shop recently, I glanced into the window and saw a poster with this quote on it:

Happiness is not a destination.
It is a way of life.

It sums up the attitude I’ve been trying to instil in myself.

Last year I blogged several times (here, here and here, for example) about my realisation that ‘life is now’. That means that I can’t wait until I’ve ‘fixed’ the things I think I need to fix and until everything is perfectly in place before I start living my life (my life is now) or before I can acknowledge that I’m happy.

And as I walked, I contemplated the quote (for which I have tried to track down a source, but I've been unable to do so) and it occurred to me that this was not just a quote about happiness. It could actually be applied to any number of things that I’m trying to address in my life.

Try replacing the word ‘happiness’ with ‘health’. 

Health is not a destination; it is a way of life. 

Of course it is. For a long time I’ve focused on an attempt to ‘get healthy’, which implies that there is some point at which the unhealthy me will suddenly be the healthy me, after which everything will be easy, I will never crave chocolate again and I will only drink two glasses of alcohol two nights a week.

I know that's not going to happen. There's not going to be a flick of the switch moment, when I suddenly become healthy.

So if I see health as, instead of an end point that I have to reach, a way of life, then the challenge is no longer to get to 'the end' (to get healthy), but to live a healthy lifestyle (to be healthy).

Instead of complaining that I’m overweight, unfit and unhealthy and telling myself I have to lose weight, get fit and get healthy, I choose to be healthy today. And every time I have a choice, if I choose the healthier option (herbal tea instead of beer; going for a walk instead of watching TV; fruit instead of cake) then I’m reinforcing being healthy. (OK, not every time. I think that’s unrealistic. But most of the time.)

Sure I might have some specific goals*, like I want to be able to run 5 km or I want to fit into my pre-pregnancy jeans**, but those goals are not the end point. They are milestones. Am I unhealthy because I can only run 4 km***? Do I suddenly become healthy once I can run 5km? Of course not. There is no end point. You don’t just achieve your health goals and then stop and go back to your old ways once you’ve done it. Health is not a destination; it is a way of life.

I feel much better for starting to live this way of life.

Something else that has been a big focus of my life and that I’ve blogged about several times could also slot right into this quote, and I’m sure there are many others too. But that’s a story for another night.

* Not my actual goals.

**That would be the immediately pre-pregnancy size 8-10s, not the 12 months pre-pregnancy size 14-16s, because fitting into those would require a certain level of relaxation of my lifestyle; and besides, I got rid of them and have no intention of ever buying a pair of jeans that size again.

*** I can’t.

P365 - Day 342 - running (Flashback Friday)

I thought I might try out the Flashback Friday concept and see how it works. I first saw the idea on Nicole’s blog a while ago and I think it fits in quite well with the ‘Past-Present-Future’ theme of my blog.

Ok, so today is actually Thursday, not Friday, but this is my blog and I make the rules around here, and if I say I can do Flashback Friday on Thursday, then I can.

Anyway, to kick off what might become a occasional series, today I’m going back to early December 2005 and reproducing an extract from my journal.

For a bit of background, several years ago I weighed 73.4 kg. For someone who is only 151 cm tall, this was somewhat* overweight. It was caused by a lifetime of unhealthy eating habits and many years of very little exercise. After Slabs and I moved to Tasmania in 2005, I made a decision that it was time to do something about my unhealthy lifestyle.

I improved my eating habits, ate a lot less, drank a lot less, and started to exercise. I started off by walking in my lunch breaks at work. This increased to walking in the mornings and, before I knew it, I’d started running.

This was a surprise to me because I'd always hated running and at school had struggled to run the couple of kilometres around the sports fields that had been required of us for phys ed and sports training. But I started off very slowly – one minute running, two minutes walking – and over about four months I built this up to being able to run for 45 minutes. And what was even more surprising was, I sort of liked it.

I felt great, looked pretty good and, for the first time in my life, felt like I was actually getting fit and healthy.

And this is what I wrote at around this time six years ago:

I’ve let myself go a bit this week, but still exercising, so it should be OK. I think ideally I’d like to lose five more kilos and get down to 51. That would be perfect, but I know that this month it’s going to be difficult with work lunches coming up. 

So I will set a goal of 51 kg by 13 February. 

This morning I did a 30 minute run (including ten sprints the length of the oval – what absolute torture, but at least not as boring as jogging around the streets the whole time.) I had plans to do the long walk tomorrow morning and run the first 30 minutes and see how long it took overall. But it is pissing down with rain (our roof is leaking, that’s how heavy it is) and the forecast is for rain all weekend. I can’t see myself getting up at any time to go out in that. No way.

And why, you might ask, have I chosen this particular flashback?

Well, I recently read about one of my friend’s achievements in completing a 10 km fun run recently. I felt really inspired by how well she had done, and thought to myself that six years ago my goal had been to complete a similar fun run.

(I stopped running when I got pregnant because the things the pregnancy hormones did to my body made it too uncomfortable to continue, so while I kept walking I also ate a lot, and I stacked on a lot of weight that I still haven’t managed to lose.)

I started thinking that if my friend can run 10 km, and I got close to it six years ago, why can’t I do it again? I seemed to have no incentive to get healthy again and was only too willing to remain in my lazygirl rut.

Earlier this week I had a bit of a moan about it on Twitter. How am I supposed to find time to do any serious exercise when I have a child, and I work and I try to keep the house clean, and I have so much gardening to do, and my lunch times are filled with doing errands so I don’t have time to even go for a walk, and, and, and  . . .

As usual, my tweeples were sympathetic and helpful, and I began to think that I might actually be able to do this and that just maybe now was the time to start.

The suggestions were simple (there’s only so much you can say in 140 characters), and were things I already knew. For some reason I just needed someone to say them to me, and this time I was ready to hear them. Simple things like making changes to my daily routine to bring in some exercise – something I've read and heard a millions times, but have thought it’s all too hard and I have no time and I’ve never made the effort to think about how I actually could do it.

This week it suddenly became a lot clearer, and now I think I can really do it.

The main reasons I want and need to do this are (1) to increase my energy levels so I’m able to keep up with with Juniordwarf, (2) to try and improve my moods and overcome my anxiety issues, because my bad days are starting to become really bad and I’m not coping well, and (3) to fit into the clothes that I bought six years ago and wore for about a month.

Also, much as I try to convince Juniordwarf that I’m 29, I’m not, and I’m getting to the age where my chance of developing ‘lifestyle’ diseases is going to increase if I don’t make changes to my lifestyle now.

I hope that these reasons will outweigh the excuses I have: (1) I can’t find a sports bra that fits (this is a serious problem if you are endowed like Dolly Parton), (2) I don’t actually like running (I didn’t six years ago either, but I grew to like it), and (3) it is going to hurt (it will, but the good feeling is going to outweigh the hurt, and last a lot longer).

Seriously, I know absolutely that making healthy choices makes me feel so much better, but for some reason, it’s easier to stay in my rut and keep doing what I’ve always done.

It doesn’t make any sense when I know how much better I can feel.

Anyway, it’s time.

I did question whether the ‘silly season’ was the right time to start, because there would be lots of excuses not to continue, but I figured that the best time to start is when I’m motivated.  If I put it off, I might just slide back down into that place I go to on the bad days and it might take several more months before I feel able to get started.

So the time is now.

Also, I have deliberately not weighed myself and I’m not going to. My aim is to get healthy, improve my moods and start feeling good about myself. If I can achieve that over time, then I don’t care what the scales say.

For someone who likes tracking progress to the nth degree (like I did in 2005), this is a big change. But I’m trying to cultivate a new attitude that the numbers on the scales are (like age), just numbers, and my measure of success will be things like more energy, better moods and feeling better about myself.

I have no doubts this will be hard – everything I’m doing has been hard, and there have been major setbacks – but it’s important, so I’m doing it.

(And just so you know I wasn’t joking, after I wrote this post I went out for the first time. I’ve started with the same routine that I had back in 2005. Even that nearly killed me, but I know I have to stick with it. I will get used to it and it will start to feel OK. I’ve done it before, so I know it will.)

 * An understatement. 

P365 - Day 315 - eleven

Yeah I know, time is a human construct, and it isn’t really 2011 anyway because a few years got skipped over a few centuries ago, and it’s just a normal day and a normal minute, and who really cares because the same time will happen in 24 different time zones of the course of the day, twice if you don’t use 24 hour time.

But even so, I think 11.11 on 11.11.11 is kind of cool.

I heard about the 11eleven project from Lil Sis.

 Its aim is to get everyone recording, tweeting, blogging, telling stories, making movies, taking photos . . . all on the same day. From everyone’s contributions, the organisers are going to create a photo book, a documentary and a music collection. There were 11 suggested themes to get you started, but really they said to record

anything that gives us an insight into your world and your perspective…..what do you want us to know about your life on planet earth?

In one sense, I guess it really doesn’t matter which day it is – the point is that everyone’s doing it at the same time. But 11.11.11 is as good a day as any, right?

My plan was to do something I’d wanted to do for a while – that is to take a photo on the hour every hour for the whole day. No matter what I was doing, I’d have to stop for a couple of seconds and take a picture (there might have been a couple of activities I’d possibly have excluded from that).

Since 11.11 is a Friday, I thought it would be a really good day for this project, since there’d be school dropoffs, work, a possible walk in the park, school pickups, scrapbooking night, a couple of beers when I got home . . . a pretty varied day.

But no, I had to get sick didn’t I? So I was at home all day thinking how incredibly boring my ‘day in the life of’ project was going to be.

I didn’t much feel like being creative either, so I decided that, in the spirit of my iPhone Project 365, I’d do the whole day’s photos on my phone.

So, while it’s not really what I wanted to do, here is 11.11.11 (#11ElevenLive) through my eyes. (I used Instagram for all photos except the 11:11 photo and the same filter - Earlybird - on each photo. I'm not sure why. Consistency seemed like a good idea at the time, but I don't know if it really works for all of the photos.)

0600 - the first thing I saw when I woke up

0700 - loungeroom mess and ABC News 24

0800  - coffee

0900 - my day as seen through my phone

1000 - cold & flu herbal tea

1100 - Lest We Forget. A minute's silence

11:11 on 11.11.11

12:00 - playing around with our holiday photos

1300 - dragging myself out to get supplies

1400 - a movie I haven't seen for years

1500 - still watching the movie

1600 - the family arrives home with the mail and my
scrapbooking/journal goodies have arrived

1700 - bringing the washing in that's been out since Tuesday

1800 - flicking through the yoga magazine I bought
while I was out. I really want to do this.

1900 - evening sky

2000 - a quick trip to my little bit of the garden.
I can't wait until I transform it into my little piece of paradise

2100 - blogging about 11/11/11

I suppose if I had to fit this set of photos into any of the project’s 11 topics (which I don’t think you have to) it would be ‘routine’ – or  the disruption thereof. That’s what happens when you get sick.

There was also the option to blog about "How do I wish the world will be in 100 years", but being at a low creative ebb, I haven't given that topic very much thought. It's an interesting challenge though.

Anyway, potentially I have two more photos to take tonight to round off 11.11.11. If I stay awake long enough, I'll take them and post them.

If not, goodnight :)

Later

Still here ...

2200 - I love that he came home from school with a
remembrance poppy today

2300 - a full moon and a very bright star

2311 - the 11:11 screen shot I missed this morning

P365 - Day 312 - yoga

Tonight I went to my first yoga class since 2006.

I’ve done yoga on and off ever since I was at uni. Most recently I did pregnancy yoga classes, but that was more than five years ago.

I’d been thinking about starting again for a while. What originally got me thinking was Judith Lucy’s Spiritual Journey, which was on tv earlier in the year. In the show, Judith talked about how practising yoga had changed her life, and it reminded me of how I too had got a lot from it when I’d done it – yet somehow still managed to keep dropping out.

Recently I was speaking to someone about the need for me to take some time to do something just for me, and also for me to find ways to relax so that I can deal with particular things that have been happening in my life.

It occurred to me that yoga might fulfil both of these needs. But I didn’t know how I was going to do it, since most of the classes around seemed to be too far away and at inconvenient times.

Then Slabs mentioned he’d seen a poster advertising local yoga classes, so I contacted the teacher and, lo and behold, the next term’s classes were about to start - in the evening - so I signed up.

It seemed like everything had fallen into place. I love it when that happens!

I’ve started getting up a bit earlier (on some days) to practise a few poses on my own, and tonight was my first time at the official class.

I think it will be really good for me.

P365 - Day 300 - the big 300

Another instalment in the occasional series on what pastpresentfuture is all about. You might also like to read Part 1 and Part 2.

This is Day 300 of my Project 365 photo project. 

Does anyone know what/where this is?

That means I have taken at least one photo every day since 1 January and posted it here on my blog. That’s 300 photos – actually more - since a lot of my posts have included multiple photos.

As well as the photo a day concept, I’ve found the blog space a good space to put my thoughts about things I’m working through n my personal life. Most times I can manufacture a photo for the day to fit what I’ve been thinking about. Or I can write a post and wait for the right photo opportunity. Whatever works.

I was discussing how much to share on a blog with a friend a while ago. I was saying that if I was having a really hard time about something and feeling really low, I didn’t really want to put that ‘out there’ in any great detail, because I’m sure no one wants to read about me moping around and moaning about things, which I do a lot*.

On the other hand, exploring some of my personality traits, insecurities or frustrations (which I’ve done several times on here) is something I feel more ok about doing.

When people leave comments on those posts or say something on one of my social networks where I share my blog, I feel reassured that I’m not the only one dealing with those issues. It also helps a lot when people comment from an outside viewpoint, and look at something in a way I wouldn’t have thought to look.

I suppose the main problems for me are firstly figuring out where the line between exploring and moping is, and secondly in deciding how much of that exploration I want to make public. Or, if you like, deciding when it ceases to be an exploration and turns into a counselling session.

I could fill up a post or more every day with subjects as diverse and fascinating as how I’m dealing with being an unhealthy perfectionist (I love that term!), why I’m terrified of talking to people, what I need to do to turn off my ‘inner critic’ and so on. (It’s a very long list, and I already have written on many of the subjects on it in more or less detail.)

In fact, I can see myself dwelling on these issues so much that I’d spend my entire life ‘analysing’ myself and not actually living. In other words, failing to appreciate the difference between thinking I have to wait until I’ve ‘fixed’ everything before I can start to relax and live life, and realising that there will never be a time when everything falls perfectly into place, so I need to get out there and live my life right now.

I know, I’ve said it before (more than once), and it’s a message I really need to get through to myself, so I’ll probably keep on saying it.

Life is now.

But it’s so easy to get caught up on the things that I need to ‘fix’ to create myself a better future and to think that everything will fall into place when that magical time comes, that I forget about the here and now. And that isn’t exactly consistent with the central premise of my blog, which is ‘present’. And I know that the magical time will never come. (Life is now.)

Past – well that’s a whole other post, and there’s some stuff I might want to write about later, or might want to leave well alone.

For now I’ll just say that I feel like I’m making some small but important changes in my life and my way of thinking that are – overall – having positive outcomes in my life. 

Sure, sometimes it’s two steps forward and three steps back, and I have my fair share of days where everything is too much, but there are other days when it’s three steps forward, one step back. But because (cliché alert) life is about the journey not the destination, that’s all perfectly fine. Overall, I feel like things are getting better within myself. (Life is now.)

I’m sure that this is due – at least in some part - to writing this blog, and getting support and encouragement from so many people, even people I don’t personally know, who take the time to leave me a comment or respond on Twitter or Facebook. It means a lot to me that you care and that you’re willing to put yourself out there and tell me that I’m not the only one dealing with this stuff.

Thank you all. 

* No I don’t. I have a tendency to keep the moan-y things inside and dwell on them. Or write them down in unintelligible handwriting. Or get all passive aggressive about them and deny that something’s wrong, even when something clearly is. Or post them in an obscure way.

P365 - Day 296 - find your passion

Go directly to the garden. Do not pass Go. Do not collect $200.

I’m one of those people who never knew what they wanted to do after they finished school. I was the career guidance teacher’s number one nightmare, and my parents despaired that I was never going make up my mind.

As a result, I changed my mind about what university course I was going to do basically on the strength of a throwaway line from a friend, dropped out of the course after one year and four weeks, and did a degree I would never in a million years have seen myself doing two years previously.

Then, having absolutely no idea what I was going to do next, I somehow landed a job in the public service in Canberra. While the prospect of moving to Canberra was less than appealing, the prospect of earning more money than I’d ever had in my life was somewhat attractive.

So I took the plunge, packed up and moved, with the intention of staying for a couple of years and then coming home and doing what I really wanted to do, whatever that was.

History will show that the ‘couple of years’ lasted a bit longer than that. It will also show that I have no more idea about what I want to do now than I did then. But all the time, I was convinced that all I had to do was find what I was passionate about, and then I’d find a way to make that a part of my working life, then I’d be doing work that I loved so much that it didn’t even seem like work*.

Only what was my passion?

I dabbled in many things. I wanted to like things. I bought stuff. I started reading books. I did career inventories. I shelved stuff. I bought more stuff. I stuffed books onto bookshelves. I assessed my Myers Briggs Type for clues. I tried to remember what I loved doing as a child. I tried to imagine my perfect job. I made plans. I ditched plans.

None of it worked. There was too much out there. How could I possibly find the one thing or the couple of things that I was truly passionate about when there was so much stuff to do? Was my gut instinct telling me what I really wanted to do, or what I thought I wanted to do, or even what I thought I wanted to want to do?

How was I ever going to know what I REALLY wanted to do?

What am I passionate about? Am I passionate about anything?

I remember reading some time about in one of the zillions of “Find out what you really want to do and go out and do it” books that I started reading (and mostly never finished) that a good clue is to find the activity that puts you into what I think they called “the zone” – that is the place where you so immerse yourself in what you’re doing that you lose track of time, forget to eat, forget to go to bed . . . and no, I don’t think they were thinking of chatting online all night.

It occurred to me today – as it has at other times – that the only time I really get that completely lost is when I’m in the garden. When these authors described this zone, they were describing what happens to me when I’m gardening.

When I’m gardening I’m in my own world. I tell myself stories, I dream, I replay incidents that didn’t work out so that I get the result I want, I have conversations with people in my head. The real world ceases to exist.

Back in the days BJ (Before Juniordwarf), I’d think nothing of spending the whole weekend in the garden. If I didn't have to eat I wouldn’t have.

But even so, it’s not something that I jump out of the door to do first thing on a Saturday morning. It is a huge effort for me to get to the point where I’m actually working in the garden and, from there, to that state where I get lost in it. It’s very easy to find something else to do, see something that has to be done, get distracted by something, and then it’s too close to lunch time or we have to go up the street, or we have to go out, or Juniordwarf wants me to do something with him, and then it’s too hot, or it’s raining or I don’t have the seeds I need or . . . .

So despite the fact that I love it, I find it incredibly hard to get motivated to do it.

It seems like a complete paradox. If I love it so much and it gets me into this other world, why then am I reluctant to get out there and do it?

The other factor that comes into the equation now, that I didn’t have before, is Juniordwarf! I want him to get more involved with the garden, but I don’t want to force him, so I just let him do pretty much what he wants outside, show him things that might interest him, let him plant seeds, do some digging and whatever else he is interested in, but most of the time he’s more interested in hanging out with Sleepydog. And the good thing about that it is it keeps her out of my way – she’s a very ‘in your face’ dog.

But getting into the “zone” is harder when I have to spend time with Juniordwarf. Not that I don’t enjoy doing stuff with him in the garden – I do, I love it – but it’s not the same.

And then if he wants to go back inside and do something else, my well-honed sense of Mother Guilt kicks in, and I feel guilty that I’m outside doing my own thing and leaving him to his own devices - despite the fact that he's probably having a great time inside with his Dad! 

This is a combination of (a) guilt that I’m relying on Slabs to spend more than his fair share of time with Juniordwarf, (b) guilt that if Slabs is also doing his own thing, Juniordwarf has to entertain himself and leaving him to his own devices for too long isn’t fair, (c) guilt that I don’t have as much time as I used to with him and that I should be spending more of the weekend with him and that spending time in the garden isn’t as important as spending time with him . . .

However . . .

If I hung out with Juniordwarf all day and did no gardening, then the jungle would continue to multiply at a crazy rate, we’d have no home-grown vegetables and every time I looked out the back window I’d feel guilty about not being out there and getting stuck into it.

Really?

For goodness sake!

I wonder if other parents struggle with this sense of guilt no matter what they do? Is this one of those things that no-one ever talks about before you have kids, and even if they did, you as a child-free adult would scoff and tell them to get over it?

Now that I’ve actually written it down, I can see how ridiculous it all seems. 

Where the hell does all this guilt come from? And that’s only scratching the surface. What purpose does any of it serve, except to make me anxious and feel bad - and for no good reason? Surely there must be better things I can put my mind to than making myself feel rotten.

It’s that nasty inner critic at it again, this time attacking me with its little arsenal of “shoulds”.

And I “should” ignore it.

Well, for a post that was just going to talk about how much I got done in the garden today, this has turned into something completely unexpected.

What can I take from this?

• I need a big push to get me started on anything, even if it’s something I love doing. This can only come from me. There are no excuses. I can either take the easy way and procrastinate, do nothing and continue to feel bad about that, or I can push through the pain of the resistance barrier, do something and end up feeling good about what I’ve achieved.

• I want to be able to get out in the garden for periods of time that will let me get a reasonable amount of work done without feeling like I’m abandoning my family. I need to talk to my family about how we can make this work – what’s reasonable, what I need and what they need. How they can help.

• I still don’t know “what I want to do”, but that’s OK for now, because at least I know what I am passionate about.

And today I had a great morning ripping out weeds, cutting branches off a tree and giving myself some hope that I might still get the vege patches under control in time to grow a few veges this year. I even found some veges growing in amongst the weeds. Yay!

* Before you tell me that this is complete piffle, and that very few people are ever able to find that work-passion balance, and that actually working with your passion can end up killing your passion, remember that I was in my early 20s when all this happened, and I really didn’t have much of a clue about anything! (Some would say I still don’t, but I choose to ignore them.)