The art of worry

The art of worrying.

If worrying were an artform, I’d be Picasso, or DaVinci, or some other famous savant in the craft. I combine my worry skillfully with millennia of guilt, thanks to my genetics and harsh upbringing. This 1 x 2 punch of worry and guilt paved the way for extreme bouts of anxiety and panic attacks later in life. From even a very early age, I recall behaving so rigidly, mastering the delicate balance between internal control and external chaos. I had utmost personal control until I was about 17. I had fallen prey to and overcome disordered eating and many more potentially damaging self-control behaviors to have some sort of balance in an unbalanced world. Once the anxiety and panic attacks began, it was significantly harder to control the deluge of emotion that had been bottled.

However, as an adult, I’ve developed much better coping mechanisms. I focus more on positivity and meditation. I have expanded my consciousness in countless ways, over many years. I do yoga and practice gratitude for the things that I am so blessed with in this life. Stemming from making it this far, when I shouldn’t have, by all accounts. Yet, I still battle my worry/shame/guilt demons regularly.

With the help of more self-help books than I can even recall, some brilliant scholars and experts on these and many more topics of interest, I can mange these character flaws more readily. But I still worry. I worry about the things that have happened, that might happen, that are likely to happen, and that could not happen in a million years. I fret about the health and well-being of everyone I have ever, and never, met. Every animal, every tree, everyone. I worry about every-single-one.

Because I’m such a skilled worrier, I barely even notice that I’m doing it, until I notice I’m doing it. I’ll have 100 thoughts of things cross my brain before I pin point that I am worrying about nothing, or everything, as it were.

More to the point though, I am actively ending this cycle of needless worrying. I am focusing on all the things that I can do, of which worrying, will not accomplish. I am focusing on the immense sense of gratitude that I feel with each breath in my chest, each beat of my heart. I think not only of the worry in the back of my psyche, but also the love that I see all around. I see the helpers, doing great things and changing the world. I am grateful for them. I choose to feel the warmth of life, instead the coldness of heartache. I believe deeply in my soul that worrying accomplishes nothing productive, but rather takes all your forward momentum out of you, leaving you bobbing in the waves without a sail.

A friend asked for advice the other day and was stressing about something that wasn’t genuinely important to really anyone. Instead my friend used the better part of a day, thinking about something that they knew the answer to, but had to have confirmation. They had to “know”, so worrying all day took all their attention away from other things, and I felt sad for them. I recognized that they were fretting about nothing and they largely ended up exactly where they started when all was revealed. Except they and another person were heated, for no good reason. So much wasted energy and emotion over something that didn’t matter. But they needed the anxiety of “not knowing” to end. So, they worried and analyzed and turned it over in their head. I am so guilty of this. I do it constantly. I’ve done it as long as I can remember. Turning over things from the past, far beyond the reaches of anyone else involved. I’m positive that the other people didn’t give these scenarios a second look, and here I am dwelling for over a decade about something that was done or said. How much energy I’ve wasted on trivialities.

I’m glad that I’ve embarked on this journey of reflection and self-actualization, because without it, I’d have taken a much longer time to recognize these things in myself that I do and feel powerless to change. I recognize my shortcomings and do better with every opportunity possible. I’m an imperfect human, bound to the confines of humanity… but I am striving to get better every single day.

This is not to discount the struggles of anyone else, by any means. I know that my friend does not want these intrusive thoughts, and they battle them often. My heart goes out to them and other like us that are often crippled with things in our heads that we cannot shake. I spent a large part of my evening one day this week rolling it over in my head how I “could have” prevented a tragedy that I witnessed. It still haunts my mind as I type this. However, my rational brain knows that it’s unlikely that there was anything that could have changed things. Possibly prolonged them, but the results were likely to be the same. It breaks my heart either way. I remember to breathe. Focus on the things that I can control in this world, and put simply, I can only control myself.

Thanks for reading.

July 19, 2019 0

Busy?

Are we really busy? Or are we distracted? Overwhelmed with all of the things that are expected from us? Straight up, burnt out? And more to the point, what can we do about it?

Last night, I had best laid plans to come home, get settled, and get writing for my 500 words and take a moment to meditate and reflect. Yeah, that didn’t happen. I had every intention of sitting down while my kiddo was eating dinner and my partner was otherwise occupied. What my rational brain did not take into account were the plans of other people. The kiddo wanted to play bubbles in the yard and call grandma. The dogs needed attention. Dinner needed cooking. Meltdowns happened when it was time to come back inside after bubbles. Downloading with my partner had to happen. By then, it was bedtime and even that was a challenge with yet another, more massive, meltdown.

It seems with our busy lives that there’s just no break. The days run together and it’s hard to catch your breath. But what if it wasn’t this way? Would we just simply fill our time with more crap to feel like we are productive? I know that I’m often at odds with “free time”. I feel like I’m not “doing” anything and therefore wasting my finite time. However, what are we really doing with a lot of this time? Yesterday, when I could have been writing at work, I was online shopping for some dress clothes and a couple things for the kid. I was also compulsively checking my email for no reason at all. I wasn’t waiting for anything important. Just kept checking, about every 30 minutes. Also, I scrolled facebook like you wouldn’t believe, or would you? Social media, while often a necessary evil to this modern world, is responsible for hours of our lives disappearing in a blink of an eye. How many times have you been mindlessly scrolling to realize that it’s been an hour, or possibly more? I can confess that it happens to me regularly. Looking down at my phone for countless minutes, only to suddenly come back to life with half my day wasted. It’s such a time-suck.

Now, this isn’t to bash on the FB, because that’s certainly easy to do. But rather, it’s to highlight that we need some things to be happy, healthy, truly productive humans. The first being, needing time to decompress. We are so stretched in our daily lives with the pressures from work, home, kids, partners, and much more. There must be a few moments each day (gasp!) where we disconnect with outside forces and focus inward. Next, we need to simplify. If it’s committing to fewer obligations in a day, so be it. We need to accept that we are human beings, and while marvelous creatures, we simply cannot keep going at the pace in which we are. It’s burning everyone out at record speed. This makes us grouchy and short tempered. It makes us unable to make the myriad of decisions we need to, with a clear head. And finally, we need to slow it all down and refocus on what is important. Yes, we all make excuses that if this or that doesn’t get done by whatever time, some consequence is looming. However, I posit this question in all sincerity. What happens to US, to our psyche, our souls, if we no longer take the time to appreciate the world around us and the people, places, animals, etc in it? What kind of life is that? Is it even one worth living?

If we do not have the deep genuine connections with those around us, what is the point? If you read a previous entry of mine, THIS IS YOUR LIFE. This is what we’ve got. We have the chance to make it everything we’ve ever dreamed of, or we can work ourselves into the ground, completely missing the beautiful experiences we could have had. And trust me when I say that I’m not coming at you with this shit from my ivory tower. I’m a working stiff just like everyone else here. I clock my hours and get paid what my employer thinks I’m worth. I’ve got bills and a family that need my attention all the time. I’ve got pets that need feeding and care. I’ve got a car that needs repairs all the freaking time. This is not a judgement. It’s a plea. The collective conscious needs to change from this scarcity mode of operation. We need to find the joy in everyday so that we are not just existing to pay bills. I certainly didn’t come into this life thinking that I was going to work to pay bills and then die. Fuck all that noise. I’m not on this planet to slave away, are you? I’m on this Earth to learn and grow, experience and change. I’m learning this more and more as I get older.

Join the revolution. It’s beautiful here.

July 18, 2019 0

Mulligan

Without making excuses, I didn’t do all the parts to my challenge yesterday. I didn’t write and I didn’t meditate for 5 mins. More like, 30 seconds before I fell asleep. So, I’m back to day one of this adventure. I’m glad that I didn’t make it to day 37 and have to start again, but I suspect that this is going to be a theme for a little while. However, even then, what difference does it really make? I’ll likely have to start over more than just this time, in all reality. Since, busy life and forgetful.

That brings up an interesting issue, that’s kind of been a theme today. Starting over, while totally annoying, isn’t always a bad thing. You get to perfect whatever it is and get it right. You get to try new ways of doing things, in hopes of learning and growing. You get to experience a deeper relationship with yourself and possibly those around you. Notice how I say “get to” instead of “have to”.

Take a look to your left right now, and then to your right. Look up, down, all around. THIS is your life. It’s the life you’ve currently got, and only you can change your circumstances to change your life, if you aren’t happy. There’s nothing else, this is what you’ve got. Sometimes that’s a really harsh reality. I’ve been there, recently. Trust me when I say accepting your station in life blows… hard. The good news that it’s never, ever too late to start over. Yes, starting over bites the big one too, sometimes. Nobody said it would be easy. Yet, in many cases it’s so fucking worth it. If it turns out that this new life you’ve created blows too, guess what? You can have another do-over!

Looking back, I’ve lived at least four distinct lives since my late teens. Each era seems like an entire lifetime in a jar, and in many cases that is exactly true. However, about every 7-10 years we totally ARE different people. All of our cells have been reborn at least once, and we are simply older and wiser, theoretically. We are shedding our old selves in slow motion almost. It’s really a cool thing about the human body. But more to the point, even our brains are reborn about every decade, leaving us to think and be new with each passing era in our lives. Hopefully we are able to learn the lessons available to us throughout this crazy journey of continually reinventing ourselves. Unless you’re like me, of course, and have to learn these lessons repeatedly and always the hard way.

Intellectually, I know better, but in real life, learning my lessons the first time, or without great challenge has been easier said than done. Though, looking back, I have to say that I welcome the struggle. In the midst of the bullshit, I can say I’d rather not, but it’s really important to me that I have struggled. Not so I can play the victim for the rest of my days, but rather so that I can know my own strength and my abilities during times of hardship. It’s important to me that I earn my stripes. I know that isn’t for everyone, and I accept that some people are just not the same as me.

Regardless of where you find yourself on the hardship spectrum, good luck to each of you on your paths. I wish you learning your lessons in a way that’s meaningful to you.

July 16, 2019 0

The Universe

When I searched Universe on dictionary.com, this is what came back.

*NOUN

(the universe)

all existing matter and space considered as a whole; the cosmos. The universe is believed to be at least 10 billion light years in diameter and contains a vast number of galaxies; it has been expanding since its creation in the Big Bang about 13 billion years ago.

When you break the word into it’s corresponding parts you get the following:

*Uni- one; having or consisting of one.

*Verse- denoting an area of activity or interest or a section of society distinguished by a particular characteristic. <there are many definitions of verse relating to poetry and writing, but they simply don’t apply to what I’m trying to discuss in this post.>

What does Uni- Verse really mean though? One place. One activity. Singular. The only one. There are some theories about multi-verses, but honestly I just don’t know enough about that sort of stuff to posit an educated response to them. So for the purpose of this entry, I am going to focus on One-Ness.

As a spiritual being, I call our Source, or what other people refer to as God, The Universe. It is the place from which we all came. The startdust, the energy, the “matter” from which we are all part of and connected to, was found in the cosmos before we were created. If you believe in Intelligent Design, or the Big Bang… we were all born out of “nothingness” and created into “somethingness”. What we do with this precious life we’ve been granted, is entirely up to us to create.

What do you spend your time creating? I choose to create a life filled with love, harmony, gratitude, respect, dignity, protection, service, honesty, tenacity, diligence, and so many more things. All of them are positive and focused on being the best person I can be, and doing everything in my human power to teach and guide and love those around me. I am constantly left in awe of the human spirit and tenacious ability to overcome adversity. We are such marvelous creatures and we can do anything. We simply have to believe it, and stop at nothing to do it.

The singularity, the one-ness that we all share is often called the collective conscious or humanity. But I believe that it is so much deeper than that. I genuinely believe that we are all interconnected. By the stardust and the energy that flows through us, we are connected with everyone and everything that has ever been created. We are part of the earth, the trees, the fish, the streams, the air, the cosmos. We are quite literally interconnected with all things, seen and unseen in the universe. It’s until we recognize this, that we feel separate, alone, and isolated. Until we realize that we could not be more wrong about being “individuals”, we will never truly reach our potential.

The potential for us to reach enlightenment, heaven, salvation… it’s the infinite, ultimate achievement. Or is it? Obviously, these questions are unanswerable by just a regular person like me. But it’s something to consider, without dogma attached. We need to consider how we behave on this plane of existence, and not concern ourselves with only the after-life, though. Because what we do here is what determines after-life in many faith traditions. You’re not guaranteed salvation if you’re a dick to people on earth, sorry to say. You will never reach the pinnacle of consciousness if you suck as a person. You cannot buy your way into heaven, not by tithing, not by playing lip service to the whatever. You have to be a good person to gain access to the good things we are promised by religion. If you don’t subscribe to a religion, that’s cool too. You’re still not allowed to be a dirtbag, a jerk, or any other sort of jackass. What you do on this planet affects us all. We are all interconnected. We are in this together, forever and ever. Remember this, and take it to heart. Everyone will be better for it, yourself included.

Thank you for reading.

July 14, 2019 0

What the world needs

To put it mildly, there’s an awful lot of terrible shit going on in the world. It’s truly mind-boggling how the 24 hour news cycle, media sensationalism, political figures, war, famine, abuse, bigotry, and all of the misery throughout every corner of the planet is beamed into our every waking moment. Thanks to social media and cable news, it’s easier than ever to see destruction and get overwhelmed by these horrors. As a matter of fact, the abundance of these terrible tragedies is so ubiquitous, that it’s created a new condition called compassion fatigue. I call it apathy.

This new, collective apathetic nature of humanity is making it even harder as a society to stop these terrible events. To me, that’s the real tragedy. We feel hopeless and powerless, when in fact, we are nothing but powerful. We have just forgotten that we create the world around us. We have forgotten that WE ARE POWERFUL.

What the world needs now, is love. Love is the light it the darkness. Love and gratitude are the only things to save us all. We can all be free if love and gratitude are the baseline. I know it sounds trite and totally cliche, but I truly believe this to be true. I can tell you, that in my own daily life, when I lead with love and gratefulness, I am better and so are those that I come in contact with.

It’s easy to be angry and hateful. It really is. It’s easy to be pissed off about your life and all the shit surrounding it. But love, especially when things don’t go our way, is really fucking hard sometimes. I’m human just like the rest of you, and I get real mad about things. However, the minute I empathize and come from a place of love, I feel better. When I feel better, I behave better and think better. If I can feel better and do better, I can radiate love and feel lighter.

It’s that lightness I want to bring into the world around me. I want to be a beacon of light. A lighthouse for those lost in a dark sea. I want to guide those ships home. Home is where the light and love are. Without the light, there’s only darkness, and that’s where the collective seem to be. Honestly, that’s the real tragedy. We’ve lost our way, and we need to spot the light. We need to follow the bright spots and let them bring us home.

Home is where the heart is. Love can grow there, thus creating more love and light. We are capable of illuminating even the darkest of places with love. What the world needs now, more than ever, is each of us to become lighthouses in all the dark places.

No, that isn’t just some hippie nonsense. Each and every one of us has the power to create light around us. Instead of yelling at the asshole who cut you off in traffic, you can say that you hope he gets to work on time, or that he needed to get somewhere in a hurry, so it’s ok that one car got in front of you. Instead of lamenting your micromanaging boss, you can understand how they may feel inadequate and powerless in their position, and those feelings spill over sometimes. Instead of flirting with your cute coworker that has a partner, you can understand how yes, the attention is nice, but how would you feel if that were your partner flirting at work or school? Rather than being mad at your lazy kids for not cleaning up after themselves, you can recognize that children are under immense pressure at home and school, as well as their brains are still being formed and cognitive ability just isn’t there yet. We can all be the light. We can all be love and gratitude, we’ve just got to do it. That’s where I am. I vow to be a light creator, and a beacon of love and gratitude. Join me. Let’s create the world we want to see.

Thanks for reading.

July 13, 2019 0

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