Small and quiet

I'm still figuring out what me calm looks like. I haven't had a lot of practice. I almost feel like one of this National Geographic shows- catching an animal doing something completely random or out of character... Or perhaps a rare breed. The story is I'm disappointed on so many levels and with so many people. Promises weren't fulfilled. Rules and expectations changed and I was blindsided or stubborn or hurt or irritated or all the above and I reacted poorly. Coming from a place of fear is normal for me. Coming from a place of compassion and love is the most difficult thing I've ever attempted.

I had a phone call with one of my mentors about this. This concept of being in the world how you want to be and how you want to be treated. I get grace... I get kindness... But f#€%, when I put all of this effort in and have the carpet pulled out from under me and I'm continually expected to just breathe through it and be ok with it? This is what I'm having a huge problem with. Sitting with disappointment. The very physical heart burn that comes from being hurt.

I'm shot of it. I need to figure something else out because this absolutely sucks... But screaming and waving my hands like a lunatic or holding onto the hurt or reacting and getting into bigger and more pervasive messes isn't helping either. This is why I'm such a big fan of ending things when they start to suck. There is no gold medal given for putting up with someone else's shit or idiosyncrasies. Would I rather be right or happy? I'd rather be happy...

I keep having to remind myself that happiness is a choice. It rains. It's pouring now and I can stay inside or go outside and curse it... I can focus on something else. Analytical frameworks and research questions don't create themselves. Or I can go outside and play. My choice.

Fun and beautiful and free can be so simple. A little smile. A walk. A cup of tea.  A beautiful conversationalist. Sometimes laughter doesn't roil. Sometimes pleasure doesn't scream. There's beauty in the paradoxes, but there's also beauty in the small and quiet.

Heavy

I feel like I'm being buried alive. I know what grace and serenity are. I am accepting... but no one said that accepting wouldn't still hurt like a bitch as you watched things around you shift and waver and shape change and some, even evaporate before your very eyes. I have things that I don't want to let go of. And maybe that's a sign that I need stronger shoulders and arms to fight, to claw my way up and to hold on.

I'm trying to remember that it's a blessing. It's a blessing having people you are afraid of losing. It's a blessing knowing your worth and the worth of what amazing people add to your world. It's a blessing having the choice to forge a future of your own design and forged with your own hard work, dedication, and passion. It's all a gift. All of it.

Petulant

I feel like a cranky child having a tantrum right now. I am so attached to something that I want and so angry at myself for wanting something that I promised myself I wouldn't want that I'm refusing to see everything else around me that I have to do and want to accomplish. 

Someone once told me that time will pass no matter what and it is. Days like today I feel like a rock, stuck in a riverbed with the current ripping rapidly around me- time is moving and I am not.

How do I turn this around? How do I make time into family and accomplish all I've set out before me? Trust me, it's one hell of an obstacle course:

Boundaries. Nothing in this world is accomplished (actually done well) without focus and focus means knowing when to do something and when to knock it off. It's knowing time is a finite resource and limiting contact with the people and things that don't allow me to focus or to utilize that time to the best of my ability.

It's trusting. Letting the eff go of certain things for bits of time, knowing I have to put things down occasionally to know what to do with them when I pick them back up.

It's breathing. And taking one step at a time. Ok, onward and upward.