Don't Borrow Trouble...or Stress, for that Matter!

Things are currently better for me than they’ve been at any point in the last year. The thing I was waiting on came through for me in the best way possible, and I’m now firmly on the path to wherever my new life is going to take me—with the tools to be successful every step of the way. More importantly, however, is the fact that I can actually see the damn road and even, if I squint my eyes, look up ahead into the future a bit. This, as anyone who has been reading this blog will know by now, is a huge relief for me. Gigantic. Epic, even.

If I needed any proof about how much happier my soul is when it has direction, I got it the first night after I heard my good news. I slept, through the night, without any artificial help, for the first time in almost 11 months. Then I did it again the next night. And the next. And the next. That’s right, my insomnia has disappeared into thin air. Poof!

It is amazing what a good night’s sleep will do for your outlook on life. I’d forgotten. But now that I’ve been reintroduced to the concept, I’ll be damned if I’m going to let anything snatch it away from me again! Unfortunately, there are still one or two lingering things from my old life infringing on my ability to ride off into the rising sun of my new life. I’m headed in the right direction, but I have a couple of unwanted stowaways in my luggage. These stowaways seem determined to peck away at my fledgling happiness (I’m just full of metaphors today, folks!), and they might be successful—if they were dealing with the old me. But they’re not. They’re up against the new me, the one who has walked through hell (not a metaphor) and come out the other end alive. The new me is stronger, re-forged by adversity and misery and all the things that make you stronger if they don’t kill you.

Also, the new me has slept. Seriously, I can’t even tell you how glorious that is after all this time.

So, right, stowaways. They can take a hike. For the most part, they’re things I have very little control over at this point. So, why let them stress me out? Yes, I want them done and gone, but it’s just not happening right now. I’m not ignoring them; I’m quite aware of their presence. I’m simply choosing to keep them at arm’s length for the duration of their stay with me. Frankly, I’ve been through worse. It’s incredible the way my outlook on life’s struggles has shifted over the last year. I have a feeling it’s going to take a lot more to faze me from now on. Because after everything I’ve been through, it’s simply not worth it to take even one baby step back into the darkness. I know what’s back there, and it’s nothing good. These days, I’m all about the light. And the sleep.

Lesson of the Day: Step into the light. And get some sleep!

This Virtue is Running Out of Steam

I have always been a patient person. I figured out long ago that very little in life is set up for instant gratification, and I’m a firm believer that some of the best things in life are that way precisely because they take some effort to get to. That’s not to say I don’t put my share of the work in; I have simply always been good at accepting that I can only do so much, and after I’ve done all I can possibly do sometimes the only thing left is the waiting.

Now, however, with all that has happened to me in the last ten months, I find my patience wearing very thin. It’s probably a byproduct of having to redirect all that patient energy into keeping myself together, but whatever the reason I am beginning to be a whole lot less graceful about the whole “waiting” thing. In short, I’m over it. I’m over the endless patience with people who don’t deserve it, I’m tired of the patience I’m supposed to be exhibiting with the universe as it works out major decisions that could make or break my life path, and I am sick unto death of being patient with myself. All the patience I have exhibited with the hand I’ve been dealt should just about qualify me for sainthood, but I will happily stick with just being me if I could get some action going and stop all this incessant waiting!

I do better with a plan. I do better with direction. And I do better with control. These three things have been sadly lacking in my life lately, at least at the levels I need to feel secure. I’m tired of feeling insecure about my life and where it’s headed. It bothers me that I can’t accurately predict where my life will sit a week from now. A week! I’m not even talking long-term planning here; I’m talking about a completely reasonable timeframe that most people can at least provide the highlights for. I got nothing. And it’s really starting to get on my nerves. It seems that, with so many endings in my life lately, all that stress (instead of dissipating) is focusing on an ever-smaller subsection of my life—a subsection that can and will change everything depending on how it goes. I’ll know something for sure by this time next week. An answer is on the horizon—but if it’s the wrong answer, I’m back to square one and more stressed out than ever.

Am I whining? A bit, I suppose. But if it were all sunshine and roses, I wouldn’t need The Reinvention Project.

Lesson of the Day: Whoever first said “patience is a virtue” left out the part about what to do when said virtue runs out!

Clean Slate

I never, ever thought that I would be starting over at this stage of my life. I had it all figured out. Career, education, family…everything was lined up and a bright future was on the horizon. My goals, dreams, aspirations—all coming together.

Until, suddenly, they weren’t.

Nine months ago my life went to hell in the space of 24 hours, and I watched all my dreams, all my hopes for my life, collapse around me. I was devastated. I didn’t know how I was going to make it through the day, much less a week, or a month, or the indefinite amount of time it was going to take to come up with an entirely new future for myself. It seemed impossible. And, in those first dark months, I wasn’t sure I even had enough left in me to try.

But human nature is a powerful thing, and it has always been my nature to persevere. So, that’s what I did. Through the horrible days and the unbearable nights, through hours when I felt so alone I could only curl up on the floor and cry, through minutes when it literally felt like my heart was tearing its way through my chest because even it couldn’t take the pain anymore…I stuck it out. It wasn’t always pretty, and it sure as hell wasn’t easy, and some days I spent every second clawing my way to a goal I couldn’t even visualize yet, but here I am. I may not be whole, but I managed to hold on to all the pieces I need to put myself back together. I may have scars, but that only means that the wounds are healing. And I don’t think I’ll ever be able to describe myself as naïve again, but knowledge is, and always has been, power.

So here I sit, situations finally resolved, endings finally written, and a blank slate before me. It’s a tiring thought, that I now have to rewrite the story of my future—luckily, stories are kind of my thing. The Reinvention Project is nowhere complete, but I can now add the element of freedom to my quest. No longer tied to my past, there’s nothing holding me back. It’s scary, but I’ve always enjoyed a challenge. The possibilities are limitless; with no one and nothing else to take into consideration, I can, quite seriously, do whatever I want with my life. I have never been in this position before, and I’m looking forward to seeing what I come up with.

I’m still weary, I’m still sad, I’m still healing—but with the last nine months as proof that I can get through anything, I have hope. And hope, as Pandora will tell you, can make all the difference in the world. It’s time to pick up my pen and get to work.

Lesson of the Day: It’s a new dawn, it’s a new day, it’s a new life.

Time Out

Yesterday, I gave myself a time out.

No, I didn’t do anything wrong. But many of the most miserable things in my life are finally moving towards a definite end, and that movement has brought its own set of complications and stress. I was feeling overwhelmed, and found myself having more “off” days than “on” days. Since I am now painfully acquainted with where too many “off” days in a row lead me, I took control and made yesterday a “no life allowed” day.

No schoolwork. No dealing with any of the issues the universe has seen fit to saddle me with in the last eight months. Just me and the day, having a good time. And it worked. I slept in, catching up on some much-needed unconsciousness that a resurgence of my insomnia has been denying me. I had a leisurely breakfast. I did some early birthday shopping (gotta love all the coupons that appear in your mailbox when your birthday month rolls around!). I went and saw a movie—and, as an added bonus, had the entire theater to myself. I came home and had a nice dinner, watched all my favorite Thursday night shows on TV, ate some cheesecake, and rolled off to bed at a semi-decent hour. It was glorious.

So many hours of our lives are scripted. We get up, we have breakfast, we go to work. We work, we come home, we have dinner, we go to bed. Maybe there’s some school thrown in there, or maybe “work” is the 24/7 job of being a stay-at-home parent. It doesn’t matter. No matter how hard we work at living life, it’s so difficult to give ourselves permission to slack off. But the truth is that all the worries that are here today will likely not be made worse if you tell them to stuff it for 24 hours. The errands can go a day without being run. There will always be something to fill your day at work. In short, the world won’t end if you take a day off.

So why not reap the benefits of being able to recharge? It took a single day of doing things that make me happy to get my batteries back in the green. I’m feeling more confident, more capable, and ready to take on this next round of challenges. Let’s face it: we work hard at this life we’re trying to make for ourselves. Once in a while, we deserve a time out. The universe can wait.

Lesson of the Day: Skip a day, gain a positive outlook.

Time for a Change

It has been nearly four months since I started The Reinvention Project. It seems like such a short amount of time, and in the grand scheme of what I'm trying to accomplish I suppose it is. Still, I can say quite confidently that, for all the potholes (and sometimes craters) I've encountered so far, I have made progress along the road I chose on New Year's Eve.

I want to take the opportunity to thank everyone who has come across this humble blog. When I began I wasn't sure if anyone besides a few friends would check it out, and I never cease to be amazed (and thrilled!) when yet another follower signs on, another comment hits my inbox, or another word of encouragement comes to me from across the country. I have solid evidence that the Project is doing exactly what I dared hope it would do: making a difference. It may be a small difference, and it may be a few people, but to hear even one person say they have been bolstered by my words makes me feel like everything I'm going through can be given a positive purpose. That feeling, for me, is its own form of therapy.

I have, as Robert Frost put so eloquently, "miles to go before I sleep." But thanks to this blog, and everyone who’s taken the time to share it with me, I no longer feel like I'm traveling that road alone.

Lesson of the Day: We’re never as alone as we think we are.

Feeling Accomplished

One of the things that makes it easier for me to get through the day (particularly a rough day) is a feeling of accomplishment. I imagine this is pretty standard, and just about everyone probably feels this way. Should be easy, right? We all accomplish things all the time. Nevertheless, I have occasionally been surprised when, thinking back on my day, I can’t find a single moment to feel accomplished about. This, I have decided, is unacceptable, because sometimes those small gold stars on the chart of my life are the only positive things I have to reflect on at the end of the day—particularly as I’m still embroiled in the “post-disaster rubble” phase of the Reinvention Project.

So, I have made a point of checking in with myself midway through the day. Have I accomplished anything yet? Do I have anything to be proud of? If the answer is yes, I smile to myself and continue on with my day. If the answer is no, I step it up, flipping through the remaining hours of my day to see if there’s anything that will give me that fuzzy feeling once I check it off my list. At first it felt odd to be so deliberate about it; now, it’s second nature. Besides being good for my mental health (some people could do with a lot more mental checking in, if you ask me), this is my moment to breathe if I’ve been on the go, and remind myself that vacant idleness hasn’t gotten me anywhere good in the last seven months if I’m drifting.

The feeling of accomplishment doesn’t take much to trigger, either, which is why it’s so useful once you hone it. Did you complete a particularly tiring workout? Finish that book you’ve been meaning to read? Wrap up a project you’ve been slaving over? Did you get the house cleaned, or make an unusually satisfying meal, or take the dog for an extra-long walk? Did you shoot off an overdue email, reconnect with a friend you’ve been neglecting, or upload those pictures that have been sitting in your memory card? Everyone has different ideas of what an “accomplishment” entails, but I’m trying to illustrate that they don’t have to be epic to serve their purpose.

Sometimes, for me, just surviving the day is an accomplishment in itself. And I’m pretty accepting of that (I’ve had seven months of having it pounded into my psyche, after all). But on the good days, I expect more out of myself. So I do my best to make sure I’m never disappointed. And as long as I can confidently give myself that gold star at the end of the day, I’m good.

Lesson of the Day: The world may be short on gold stars, but that doesn’t mean you can’t craft your own!

An Overabundance of Perspective

Just when I think I have all the life perspective I can possibly handle, the universe finds a way to shove some more down my throat.

I have spent the last month dealing with the unraveling of one of the few aspects of my life that has remained more or less stable through this mess: my physical health. I went to the doctor in early February to get an explanation for some highly unpleasant symptoms I was experiencing, and came away with the number of a specialist and the name of the very cancer that killed my grandfather a few years ago echoing in my ears.

The wait between that initial doctor’s appointment and my appointment with the specialist was awful. The wait between the specialist’s appointment and the procedure he wanted to do to rule out cancer was even worse. I had to make a very unpleasant call to beg for a halt to some of the other things going on in my life (things that necessitated The Reinvention Project in the first place, and things I just want to END, not drag out) so I wouldn’t lose my medical insurance. I had flashbacks to when my grandfather died. I had nightmares about having cancer, and all the things that could go wrong. I ran scenarios in my mind about whether I’d even be able to handle such a blow after all the blows I’ve already taken. If there was anything that would trump every other disaster in my life that I’ve been clawing my way through, it would be a cancer diagnosis.

This last Tuesday I found myself being checked in to the hospital, with a friend beside me who I will love forever for stepping in to fill the void left by the person who decided seven months ago that standing by my side was no longer a job description they wanted. This friend stayed with me until the second I was wheeled away for my procedure, suffering through my inevitable freak-out at being in the hospital and having an IV put into my arm (even typing the words makes my heart rate go up—I do not do well with hospitals, and have a phobia of needles that makes all things medical akin to psychological torture for me). She was also the first face I saw and the first voice I heard when I came out of anesthesia afterwards, and though I’ve forgotten the bulk of what happened between when they first gave me the anesthesia and when I was wheeled out of the hospital to my friend’s car due to the medication’s effects on my short-term memory, I will never, as long as I live, forget that her presence kept me calm and feeling not alone.

Feeling “not alone” while you’re waiting to hear if you have cancer is a very, very important thing.

And, as it turns out, I do NOT have cancer. I had something else, which has since healed, and I am as healthy as I ever was. But in that short amount of time when the possibility loomed, I gained yet more perspective on this life I’m trying to rebuild from the ground up. Hence today’s lesson…

Lesson of the Day: Living may sometimes suck, but the alternative is unacceptable.

All the Little Things

Oddly enough, it takes very little to make me smile these days. I suppose that when every major aspect of your life goes so completely wrong, the little things are all you have left. There are many things I used to take for granted, things that I never acknowledged in any significant way for the happiness they brought to my life. But now, those days are over.

The last seven months have taken me to depths of despair I never knew existed, depths I’m not yet nearly far enough away from. That sounds overly dramatic, doesn’t it? Well, dramatic or no, it’s the truth. It feels as though I have become the universe’s very own punching bag, particularly when the remaining stable areas of my life are picked off one by one like some sort of cosmic game of Duck Hunt (which has happened more than once in the last month). So, the big things have become, to understate, unreliable sources of happiness.

Fine. Screw the big things. Life isn’t about the big things, anyway, is it? This jumbled string of minutes that makes up our days is full of small moments and things, seemingly insignificant, that create the massive whole we’re all a part of. And if I am going to have any hope of getting through this disaster that stubbornly insists on not ending, I no longer have the luxury of ignoring them. For example:

~ A sunny day. It was unseasonably gorgeous outside today, and I was so grateful for the opportunity to put my to-do list on hold, grab a book, and sit outside to enjoy it.

~ Chocolate chip cookies made from scratch. Chewy, just the way I like them, and enough of a stockpile to get me through a rough week.

~ A good TV show. There’s nothing like being able to escape into another world for an hour or so, to take a temporary break from reality.

~ Planners. I love whoever invented the planner. I would never get anything done if it weren’t for mine!

~ Candlelight. Such a small thing, so easily accessed, and it never fails to soothe me.

~ A good pair of running shoes. Working out my troubles while pounding the pavement has gotten me through more than one impossible day.

~ Granny Smith apples. One of my favorite fruits, and my current snack of choice. Especially with some salt sprinkled on the slices.

~ A favorite book. Like old friends, and even better than a good show, I have a few beloved works that I turn to whenever I really need to get out of my head. They never let me down.

~ Flip-flops. That’s right, flip-flops. They signal warm weather, and it makes me incredibly happy to be able to bust them out of their winter hibernation.

Are these large, life-altering things? No. Do they completely balance out the misery I sometimes feel smothered in? Not really. But they do shine tiny beams of light through the darkness. And if I pay close enough attention to the light, sometimes I can forget the darkness for a little bit. It’s a lesson I’m getting better and better at adhering to, and one that I plan to take with me and hold close no matter what the future holds. Because I have found that there really is value in occasionally stopping to smell the roses.

Lesson of the Day: Sometimes, it’s the small things in life that make life worth living.

Sorting Out My Priorities

It has been, to put it mildly, a rough few weeks. A lot of that waiting I talked about a few posts ago took a giant step forward, and instead of being relieved I found myself relapsing into a depressive episode on a level I honestly thought I was beyond. So, I can now personally attest to another truth about depression: it is entirely possible to experience a relapse. (For more information on depression, see my January 28, 2010 post, Taking Down Depression.) No wonder it’s known to be such an insidious illness.

At any rate, there has been a lot of “just making it through” going on, and that hasn’t left me with either the energy or desire for much of anything else. The tactics I’ve been using for the last six months to keep my head on straight aren’t as effective as they used to be. My patience for all this *waves arms around wildly* is waning. It’s time to step up The Reinvention Project. I’ve decided to try to think a bit further into the future; to look to the ever-nebulous “other side” I will supposedly come out on when everything making my life a whirlwind of discontent finally resolves itself. If I can visualize this new life of mine, maybe it will be easier to hold out for it. To that end, I decided to make a list.

I jumped on to http://www.tadalist.com/, a lovely website devoted to list-making, and created the following:

Adventures for 2010
~ hot air balloon ride
~ skydiving on my birthday
~ hiking to waterfalls in the spring
~ run three 5Ks
~ join a writers group

The first three items are things I’ve been dying to do for years, and the opportunities just didn’t present themselves in my old life (I have a specific state park in mind for the hiking). The last two items are geared towards personal improvement for the benefit of my new life. The important thing about this list is that each thing is completely do-able this year. Only the first two items cost any significant amount of money, and neither cost is prohibitive.

One of the facets of my new life that I’m most eager to incorporate is not waiting so long to do the things I truly want to do. One of the hard lessons I’ve learned is that life is unpredictable. You can have it all planned out one day, and not know which way is up the next. Life itself will get in the way of you doing any actual living if you let it. As I am rebuilding from the ground up, now seems like the perfect time to make sure that doesn’t happen anymore. The things I want to do, the adventures I want to have, are going to take a much higher priority in my new life. That knowledge is getting me through when other distractions fail.

The above list-in-progress will seem inane to most people, I imagine. Plenty of people couldn’t care less about waterfalls, and relatively few have the urge to jump out of a perfectly good airplane. But are you prepared to deny that you have such a list in the back of your mind? If you sat down right now with a pen and paper, what small things have you been dying to do, or try, or see, that you keep putting off? Forget about expensive dream vacations (Rome is on my personal long-term wish list) or the desire to change careers. Think smaller. Is there a play you want to see? A favorite band in concert? Have you always wanted to try a particular craft? Maybe you have a secret desire to try an online computer game. Or go to a tasting at a local winery.

You think about these things from time to time, and each time you think to yourself, “Someday soon I’m actually going to make this happen. Maybe next month. Maybe next year.” But soon never seems to arrive, and the months pass, and the years pass, and life gets in the way of all your best intentions. It happens to us all. My list has been with me for years. But you know what? Six months ago that list was longer. I’ve already begun to check things off. And each checkmark is another completion of something important to me. Something that makes my life richer, more colorful. And isn’t that the point of life, after all? To live it?

Lesson of the Day: Life is for living. Make it happen.

Hoping for the Best, Preparing for the Worst

My life over the last five months has seemed like an absurd string of worst-case scenarios. As a result, I now find myself rewired to immediately come up with the worst possible outcome for a given situation. While this might not seem like the best disposition for someone currently prone to episodes of depression, I find it serving a constructive purpose in spite of the less pleasant effects of raising my blood pressure and making me cry at random intervals.

I can prepare! I can come up with Plan B and C and go on down the line for as long as my pessimism (or perhaps just realism at this point) holds out. Now that I have no naïve illusions that the worst can’t possibly happen to me, I can get down to the business of making sure the worst doesn’t carve another pound of sanity from my psyche if it does come to pass.

Now if that doesn’t demonstrate my mad silver-lining-finding skills, I don’t know what does.

Lesson of the Day: Hope for peace, but wear your flak jacket!

When 1 Really IS the Loneliest Number

I have never minded being alone.

I don’t mean that I’m anti-social or that I prefer to be alone, because have plenty of friends and I rarely turn down the opportunity to hang out with other people. I simply mean that when a situation plays out so that I’m by myself, I’m not bothered by it. This has come in handy in recent months, as I am now on my own the majority of the time. Having only myself for consistent company has not kept me from going out to eat, or watching movies, or heading out on multi-day road trips—all things I have done quite successfully, alone, over the last five months.

In fact, being alone has its advantages—advantages I have pointed out to myself on more than one occasion as a temporary remedy for my inevitable loneliness. There’s no arguing over what to eat, or when. There are no fights about what movie to see. Everything in the house is mine, set up the way I want it and situated to make my life more comfortable. If I want to go out, I go out. No waiting for someone else to get ready, and no discussions about it. If I want to stay in, I stay in. My free time is my own. No one hassles me about how they think I should be spending it. I don’t have to take anyone else into consideration when I make decisions, something that has greatly simplified my world. Yes, there are indeed advantages to being the number one person in my life.

That being said, there are times when being alone flat-out sucks. This suckiness is, perhaps, magnified by the fact that I didn’t choose to be alone, but rather had all this aloneness thrust upon me against my will. (This is also why I spend so much time coming up with reasons why being alone doesn’t suck in the first place.) Whatever the case, there was a lot of non-happy alone time this weekend, because I was sick. Not just “oh, I’m not feeling all that hot” sick, but “I went to the doctor and came back with multiple prescription medications” sick. I was flat on my back for three days. And I was alone. And it sucked royally.

There was no one to get me a glass of water. No one to pick up my prescriptions from the pharmacy for me. No one to make me soup. No one to grab an extra blanket for me when my fever gave me chills. The house didn’t get cleaned. Errands didn’t get run. Studying didn’t get done. On the other hand, in spite of how crappy I felt, the animals needed to be looked after, meals needed tending, mail needed to be brought in (but only because I was waiting for something important; otherwise that wouldn’t have gotten done, either). It was awful, misery on top of misery and all I could think about was how much I really, really didn’t want to be alone. If I didn’t have the cats (who, bless their little feline hearts, could tell I wasn’t feeling well and curled up with me for all three days to keep me company), I might have spun into a real funk over the whole thing.

As it stands, I’m exhausted today, partly from being sick and unable to lie down (I have a lot of responsibilities stacked up on Mondays) but partly from the emotional toll this weekend took on me. This is one problem for which there is no solution. I am alone, and sometimes it is going to suck, and there’s nothing to be done about it. I just have to get used to it as one of the more unpleasant aspects of my new life. I just wish this particular life lesson had waited until I was something other than miserable and drugged to the gills. Ugh.

Lesson of the Day: Sometimes, it’s just gonna suck.

How Valentine's Day Got My Groove Back

I have been feeling decidedly drifty the last couple of weeks. This driftiness has manifested in all sorts of ways: simple errands not getting done even though I write them in my planner day after day, hours going by that I seem to miss entirely, cleaning going by the wayside (a big thing for me, as I’m a bit of a neat freak), even this blog being neglected.

Upon reflection, I can come up with at least a partial picture of why this has happened. First, there are several key decisions that need to be made in various areas of my life in order for me to begin moving on. Unfortunately, all those decisions are in other peoples’ hands now, as I have done everything I can on my end, and there is a lot of waiting happening. Second, I am tentatively beginning to feel as if I am over the absolute worst of the effects of my life-turned-disaster. It has been roughly five months since my world fell apart in a short 24 hours, and in those five months I have wrangled myself through hell and am beginning to see the light. Someone who has a knack for analogy gave me a particularly apt one:

It’s like I’m halfway across a desert. When I began my trek, five months ago, I was unsure that I would survive. I didn’t know if there would be food, or water, or any of the things I would need to make it to the other side. Nevertheless, having no other choice, I took my first steps and began my journey. Now, I am smack in the middle. I have found reliable sources of food and water, and I am more certain each day of my eventual success in crossing the desert. However, knowing that there is, in fact, an end is not the same as being able to see the end. I have come too far to turn back, so my only option remains forward movement. I know there will come a day when I take my final steps off the hot sand and into greener country, but that knowledge only lessens the frustrations—it certainly doesn’t get rid of them completely, and there are still days when I just find a cave and wait out the day, unwilling to travel any further for awhile.

Poetic, no?

However, I found a driftiness remedy in the most unlikely of places: Valentine’s Day. This was, as far as I was concerned, yet another holiday to drag through for the first time since everything happened. I was considering, especially given my recent mood, a long bout of wallowing followed by gazing with glassy eyes at the TV until the clock hit midnight and I could breathe a sigh of relief that the damn day was finally over.

But, in case you haven’t yet gathered, that’s not really my style. Why, I asked myself, should I be forced to hide from this day? It’s a day about love. Sure, it’s more about romantic love than anything else I suppose, but how many people every year loathe this day for that very reason? Screw romantic love’s exclusive rights on February 14. It’s likely that I won’t be applying that particular connotation to Valentine’s Day again for quite some time, but I saw no need to miss out because of a cruel twist of fate. So, I plotted to make this day about different kinds of love, instead.

Yesterday, I bought myself flowers. Not a Valentine’s Day bouquet (truth be told, I don’t even like roses), but one I made myself of beautiful yellow carnations (my favorite flower) with fiery orange petal tips and irises (a flower in my favorite color). Everything about these flowers is positively cheery, and they make me smile every time I glance over at them in my favorite vase. I also bought myself a bag of Reese’s peanut butter cups (one of my favorite candies) and placed them in the fridge (because they’re always better cold) in preparation for today. Finally, I returned an email I’d gotten from the shelter I adopted my cats from, saying that I would be happy to volunteer at their adoption event on Valentine’s Day.

Fast-forward to today. I woke up and drove to the shelter, wrangled a couple of canines into my SUV, and hauled them to the local PetSmart where I and two other volunteers spent the day trying to convince people to adopt a dog. I was at it from 9:30 to 3:30, and we did in fact manage to get one of the four dogs with us adopted on top of drumming up a lot of interest for the shelter. This was me, celebrating love: the love of the other living things I share this planet with. I felt good about getting a puppy a new home, spent the day with some wonderful animals, and found a couple of new friends in my fellow volunteers.

Volunteering complete, I came home and indulged in some spa products I received for Christmas. Then I got dressed up, took myself out for sushi, and went to see a movie (Wolfman, which can in no way be construed as a romantic flick). Finally, I returned home tonight, pulled out those delectable Reese’s, and happily munched away on my dessert while watching the Olympics. All this was me, celebrating love: the love and respect I have for myself, for what I’ve been through, and for recognizing that I deserve to be taken care of—even if I’m the one doing the caring right now.

So, I am chalking this day up in the WIN column. It could have been misery of epic proportions. It wasn’t. Would it have been nice to have someone to share it with? Of course, especially since until this year I have always has someone to share the day with. Still, it was a truly lovely holiday, one that left me satisfied and tired at the end, one where I did not wallow even a tiny bit, one where I finally rose above the lethargy that has had me in its grip for the last two weeks.

Lesson of the Day: The day is what you make of it!

How to Stave off Insanity in 2 Easy Steps

There’s a quote contributed to R.D. Lang that suggests, “Insanity—a perfectly rational adjustment to the insane world.” This wisdom has seemed, more often than not in recent months, completely reasonable to me. However, insanity comes with all sorts of downfalls, not the least of which is the inability to properly function in said insane world. So, I have refined a two-step plan guaranteed to stave off unwanted insanity (or your money back for asylum fees!):

Step 1: Figure out what keeps you sane.
Step 2: Make damn sure you have access to whatever you decide in Step 1.

I have had to compromise, cut back, give up, and let go quite a bit recently. Sometimes it’s been fairly tolerable. More often…well, not so much. But scattered around in the remains of my life have been beacons to guide me back to the path of sanity when the road gets a bit muddied. All I have to do is recognize them, and then make sure I keep them with me. Simple.

Right.

So, what have I come up with? What constitutes “sanity-preserving?” Sometimes it’s something that makes me smile when I’d rather cry. Sometimes it’s something capable of distracting me from unpleasant thoughts. Maybe I need to be calmed down, or need an excuse to let out some aggression. Whatever it is, I’ve gotten very good at paying attention to what I need, and then supplying myself with the remedies.

Need a surefire way to occupy my mind with something other than what’s going on in my life? School to the rescue! Nothing clears the mind like studying Art of the Novel. Need to laugh? Bring on Jon Stewart. Need an excuse to cry without it feeling random and uncontrolled? I recently went to see Extraordinary Measures. Nothing lets loose the waterworks like Harrison Ford and Brendan Fraser trying to save children from an incurable disease (bonus points for being based on a true story!). Books. Movies. Writing. The occasional trip to Cold Stone Creamery. The point is, I have figured out how to get what I need to push back from the insanity table. So far, so good.

Lesson of the Day: Insanity can suck it.

Pet Therapy

There’s nothing quite like owning a pet. First, there’s a level of unconditional love that you could never get from another human. Then there’s the instant calm that results simply from petting or playing with a pet. And let’s not forget the addition of another warm body in the house, one you can talk to and get the sense that it’s listening so that you never feel like you’re holding a conversation with yourself. All in all, pets are fantastic.

I’ve been going back and forth about adopting a pet for the last few months. I already have a rabbit, but he’s not the most interactive animal, and I’ve been feeling the need for another, more responsive body in the house now that I’m on my own. Growing up I had a dog, so I was looking at dogs as primary candidates, but I finally settled on a cat. One cat, however, turned into two, and this weekend I adopted two adults (one 2 years old and one 11 years old—a senior cat!) from a local animal shelter.

I can already feel the difference. I’m no longer alone! No, I don’t have another human in the house, but having two animals running around at all hours is getting the job done just fine. One of the cats is also turning out to be a definite lap cat, and she lies with me while I study. Both cats are content to lounge around the living room and watch TV with me, and neither seems to mind hanging out on her own when I leave for class or go out to run errands. Without fail, though, at least one of them greets me at the door when I get home.

If you have the means, and the desire, adopting a pet of any kind can be a very rewarding experience. And it doesn’t have to be the traditional cat or dog, either. I have a friend who recently adopted a hedgehog, and is quite thrilled with his new companion. I know people who are content to take the look-don’t-touch approach with fish. One friend in particular can’t seem to get enough of animals, and has a dog, a turtle, two frogs, a tank of fish, and a hamster. The point is, there’s an animal for everyone. And whether you’re beginning a new phase is your life, or have been putting off getting a pet even though you really want one, why not take the plunge? Of course, there are several things to consider:

• Finances: Some animals are more expensive than others. For example, my two cats require yearly vet appointments at the least for shots and such, but my rabbit hasn’t been to the vet in years, and won’t need to go unless he’s sick. There’s also food, toys, bedding, and species-specific accessories to take into consideration. Definitely do your research!
• Time: If you’re out of the house for 10 hours a day, a dog is probably not for you because you have to factor in letting one outside several times a day. A cat, however, is perfectly fine on its own for longer stretches of time (yay litterbox!). Caged animals work much the same way, with varying degrees of attention needed. No matter what the animal, are you willing to devote the time necessary to clean up after it, feed it, and play with it? Some people forget that a pet is a living thing completely dependent on you for its survival and well-being. If you’re not willing to make the effort, a pet is not for you!
• Space: Do you live in an apartment? You should probably skip the Great Dane. Animals come in all shapes and sizes, and you really just have to narrow down what size will work within the space you have available.
• Other members of the household: Do you have children? Other pets? An allergy-prone spouse? Many animal shelters now require every member of the family (human and non-human alike) to meet a potential adoptee to see if everyone will get along. Make sure everyone is in agreement and understands the responsibilities involved. And make sure any existing pets will get along with the new pet. Hunting breeds were out of my dog search immediately, as I could imagine exactly how that introduction to my rabbit would go!
• Shelter or pet store? I am a strong advocate of adopting from a shelter. If you’re not sure where to begin a search, try here. This site will give you access to the “inventories” of all the shelters in your area, and give you the links to those shelters so you can check out their websites directly and get info on their adoption policies.

Pets place a lot of responsibility on their human owners, but the love and devotion they give back is well worth it. There’s a reason why hospitals have programs that allow specially trained animals to visit patients. It’s no surprise that dogs are entrusted with the care of humans who need help (seeing-eye dogs) and humans in general (police dogs). Don’t have the inclination to take on the responsibility but would still like to reap the benefits? Volunteer at your local animal shelter. Shelters are mostly non-profit organizations that exist at the mercy of a huge and ever-changing team of volunteers. They always need people to pet cats and walk dogs—seriously, I’ve done both—and would be thrilled to have you come in pretty much any time that works with your schedule.

Lesson of the Day: Jump on the animal-loving bandwagon—it’s all warm and fuzzy!

Taking Down Depression

Today, my readers, we are going to talk about depression. Why, you ask? Because depression is an insidious bastard and needs to be addressed. Because the more it’s talked about, the harder it is to see it as a shameful secret. Because it’s a reality for many, many people, and it’s important for those people to feel like they can speak up and get help.

According to the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH), depressive disorders affect approximately 18.8 million American adults, or about 9.5% of the U.S. population ages 18 and older, in a given year. I am currently one of those people. That’s right, I said it, and I’m not going to hide from it. It’s part of my current reality, and I’ve never been one for self-denial.

So what, exactly, is depression? Well, the NIMH informs me that there are several different kinds of depression, and the reasons behind them, their scope of influence, and their effects are as varied as their types. I’ll focus on the type that closest fits the symptoms I’ve had, “major depressive disorder,” because that’s the one I can intelligently speak about, but the other types can be found here. Basically, depression is a mood disorder that affects you to the point that you have difficulty functioning normally. It’s beyond feeling blue or having a bad day. Symptoms vary from person to person, but here’s a round-up of indicators put together by the NIMH:

• Persistent sad, anxious or "empty" feelings
• Feelings of hopelessness and/or pessimism
• Feelings of guilt, worthlessness and/or helplessness
• Irritability, restlessness
• Loss of interest in activities or hobbies once pleasurable, including sex
• Fatigue and decreased energy
• Difficulty concentrating, remembering details and making decisions
• Insomnia, early–morning wakefulness, or excessive sleeping
• Overeating, or appetite loss
• Thoughts of suicide, suicide attempts
• Persistent aches or pains, headaches, cramps or digestive problems that do not ease even with treatment

I can personally attest to the validity of this list, as each bullet point has been something I’ve struggled with over the last several months. It’s damn difficult to function like a normal human being when you’re under the yoke of even one of these symptoms. Throw them together in combination, which is what depression does, and you’re talking about a full-on war against yourself. In the morning, getting out of bed is a struggle. Finding the will to do anything is a battle of epic proportions. At my very worst, I’ve found myself curled up in a ball on my bedroom floor, sobbing and unwilling to move for fear of what I’d do if I did. It’s not pretty, let me tell you.

The feelings are difficult to explain to someone who hasn’t ever felt them. The best I’ve been able to come up with is what I imagine possession might feel like. One minute I’m going about my business, making it through my day, and the next it’s like something else has completely taken me over. Before the events that make The Reinvention Project necessary happened, I was a pretty stable person. I didn’t really have highs and lows in mood, I didn’t cry a lot (or easily), and I was fairly balanced and leaning towards the happy side of the emotional scale. Now…well, that person is someone I hope to be again, but for now I try to deal with the dual personality I have developed.

I have heard people say that there’s only a certain type of person who ends up with depression. They’ve insinuated that intelligence plays some sort of factor, or that someone is “too strong” to ever end up struggling with a depressive disorder. I’m here to tell you that depression doesn’t discriminate. I never thought I fit the “type,” either. Now I know that there is no type. Given the right set of circumstances, depression can take anyone down. The important thing, I’ve learned, is to acknowledge the issue as quickly as possible, and get help.

Having depression doesn’t make you weak, and acknowledging that you need help is one of the strongest things you can do for yourself. I always felt like I could take anything on myself, that I never really needed help from anyone else. But realizing that what was going on in my head was not normal sadness, and finding the strength within to pick up the phone and ask someone for help, very likely saved my life. So I’m asking you, as one human being to another, to take a look at that symptoms list. Do you see yourself in it? Do you recognize a friend or family member? If you answered yes to either of these questions, get help. It’s okay to need it, and it could save your life—or someone else’s.

National Institute of Mental Health: information on depressive disorders, how to recognize them, how to combat them, where to go to get help for yourself or someone you know

Depression Resources: A list compiled by WebMD of various sources on depression information and help.

National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: A phone hotline dedicated to helping anyone in suicidal crisis or emotional distress. 1-800-273-TALK (8255).

The National Hopeline Network: Vetted by PostSecret, this network provides a multi-platform help network for those in crisis (phone, email, online chat). 1-800-442-HOPE (4673).

If you have any other resources or information, feel free to comment on this post and add your knowledge!

I Get By With a Little Help from My Friends

Want to know who your real friends are? Place yourself in the middle of a life in utter ruins, and see who comes to help you pick up the pieces. You might be surprised.

I have been incredibly fortunate to have had a fantastic and unfailing support system throughout the various disasters in my life over the last several months. My family, of course, rallied immediately, doing that familial thing they’ve always done so well. Their loyalty and support was never even a question. Other, non-family people, however, have stepped gracefully into my life to help keep the few columns that remain from crashing down on top of me. This phenomenon is what I focus on daily, to remind myself that I have more people who think I’m worth supporting, worth befriending, worth including in their lives, than I ever knew.

Some of these saviors were already established in my life as co-workers, acquaintances, and friends who I saw “once in a while.” They heard about what was going on and took it upon themselves to become more than once-a-month friends, contacting me through various outlets to ask how I was doing, if there was anything they could do to help, if I needed to talk or wanted to hang out. These gestures were not a one-time occurrence; they began happening routinely and continue to this moment. These are busy, busy people, with families and lives and trials of their own, and I can’t imagine when they have the time to think of me—but they do.

Others are people who I was once friends with, perhaps even good friends, but time being what it is, we slipped away from each other. Ironically, the very events conspiring to cause such strife in my life were the same events that led me back to these once-and-future friends. Through the magic of 21st-century social media, they saw that I seemed to be having trouble and decided to reach out to me. As it turns out, several of them were having (or were just coming out of) similar troubles, and could not only sympathize, but empathize. They say pain shared is pain halved, and these wonderful people knew that, and endeavored to show me that I was not alone. These are the voices who stay up with me late into the night when I can’t sleep (which is often), companions to my chronic insomnia. The nights are the worst. These people get me through them.

Still others are good friends who have gone so far above and beyond that I can only hold them up as shining examples of what true friendship is—and hope that I have been as a good a presence in their lives as they have been in mine.

Words cannot express what these people mean to me, or what they’ve done for me. There have been days when a well-timed Facebook message or a random phone call has, quite seriously, been all that stood between my fragile psyche and a padded room. Being reminded that there are people in the world who don’t have to care about me but do anyway, just because I’m me, has done more to help me begin this journey to reinvention than all the inner strength I could ever conjure up. It’s true that most days I do this for myself, because I want to come out of this a better, stronger person, because I refuse to let anything get the best of me. But some days, the ones when I look at myself in the mirror and can’t conjure up the desire to try for myself alone—those are the days I remember all the people who’ve shown me that they think I’m worth keeping around. I lock their faces in my mind, stand up straight, and try anyway.

Lesson of the Day: Pick up the phone, log on to Facebook, send an e-mail, tweet away—the message you send may have more of an impact than you could possibly imagine.

Who Am I?

I will never again be the person I was six months ago.

This is one of the more psychologically difficult truths to accept as I delve deeper into The Reinvention Project. In small ways, we are constantly changing. That’s the beauty of humanity—our capacity for transformation, for adaptation, for growth in every sense of the word. It’s a trait to be embraced—but I’m speaking on a much larger scale.

There have definitely been some surface changes in the sum of what makes me, me. My tastes in music have shifted in notable (and perhaps predictable) ways. There’s no telling how long it will be before I can listen to fluffy pop music again without sneering (and, really, what did Colbie Caillat ever do to me?). I’ve always enjoyed Breaking Benjamin, but I have lately found a connection to their undeniably apt lyrics that I find oddly cathartic. (Feeling angsty? Pull out Dear Agony, their latest album. It’s magnificent.) There are music groups I have always adored and now can’t stand, simply for their connotations. Hell, there’s an entire country that, when referenced (and it is, with appalling frequency), has the power to reduce me to tears. And movies? Don’t even get me started on movies. Let’s just say Bruce Willis a la Die Hard and Harrison Ford a la Indiana Jones are getting a serious workout in my DVD player these days.

But these types of changes, which can happen under a nearly infinite number of circumstances, some completely benign, are not the only differences I’m contending with. There are certain fundamental shifts in my very personality, in the deepest core of who I am, that could never have happened except under life-altering circumstances—circumstances I never anticipated, but am nonetheless dealing with. These are the changes I’m grappling with the most.

To be perfectly frank, this angers me to levels I didn’t even know I was capable of. I’ve always been quite sure of who I am. I liked who I was six months ago. I was a well-rounded, stable, compassionate, loyal individual who loved deeply and lived happily. That some force outside of me affected such changes so deep within me feels like the worst possible invasion of my being. It disgusts me, and in my darker moments I’m furious with myself for allowing anything or anyone to weasel their way inside me so completely that they were even able to accomplish such an utter destruction of the components essential to who I am. So I struggle, daily, with this concept of the now-gone “old” me versus the in-progress “new” me.

Yet another facet of The Reinvention Project, then, is the sometimes uncomfortable and almost always exhausting notion of figuring out who I am, of reacquainting myself with, well, myself. The opportunities for doing this seem to appear at the most surprising of times, mostly when I find myself reacting to something in ways my “old” self never would have. In class tonight, we were discussing the book “Thirteen Reasons Why,” a young adult novel that deals with the topics of teen depression and suicide. I found myself, in the face of several classmates who were less than impressed with the book, vehemently defending it. Their arguments revolved around the character who commits suicide. Her reasons, they said, were not enough. Surely someone as supposedly intelligent as this character would never have been depressed to the point of suicide over such tiny things. Their (obviously uninformed) assumptions about depression, which the “old” me had no personal experience with, as well as their comments on the “intelligence” factor of people who consider suicide, had my hackles up immediately, and I found myself having to refrain from an all-out rant on just what depression can do to a person.

Depression is a topic on which the me of six months ago would have had nothing informed to say. The new me, however, apparently has a lot to say (fodder for future posts, no doubt), and my reaction in class has been food for thought all evening—and, as you can guess, prompted the theme of this post. Yes, I have changed, in ways I’m only just beginning to recognize. I’m trying to take such revelations as they come, without letting them overwhelm me. It’s not easy—but what about rebuilding yourself from the ground up is?

Lesson of the Day: Being in the dark makes the sudden beams of light that much brighter, and sometimes the most you can do is throw on the sunglasses.

Relying on Self-Reliance

It has been roughly five years since I’ve had to clean a tub. Or lift something heavy by myself. Or kill a spider. It’s not that I can’t do any of these things. (On the contrary, my independent streak is fairly legendary.) It’s that I’ve had someone else to depend on, someone to take over a few of the less desirable tasks of domesticity, or at least split them with me. I’ve had a partner. I had a partner.

Everyone likes having someone they can look to when they’re in need of a helping hand. In the most intimate of situations, that person is a spouse or significant other, and they fulfill more than just the title of resident bug-squasher. They close the circle of emotional, mental, and physical needs that help make us complete human beings. The longer they’re in our lives, the more we become dependent on them. We set aside what we know we can provide and do for ourselves because it’s simply no longer necessary to provide or do them. We limit ourselves unconsciously, willingly, to make room in our lives for a relationship more important than our independence. So what happens when the circle is broken, when we’re suddenly left holding the scrub brush or the heavy furniture or the flyswatter?

I found myself pondering that very question a couple of days ago as I stared at the smallish but (I was fast realizing) really heavy bookshelf stuffed into the back of my SUV. I had bought it from a thrift store, fully assembled, without a second thought. Three burly employees loaded it for me, and I drove my merry way home, pleased with my find. Unfortunately, I realized my mistake as soon as I pulled into the driveway—I should have bought the three burly employees, as well! I considered my options: I could go next door and beg the help of the neighbor I barely knew beyond the occasional “good morning.” I could leave the shelf in my car for an indefinite amount of time until another friend was able to come over and help me. I could try to disassemble it, though it was really more of a “once it’s together it’s together” piece.

So, there was nothing for it but to channel my inner weight-lifter. I’ll spare you the gory details, but I eventually managed to remove the shelf from my car and get it into my living room with no damage to either of us. That would have been cause for celebration—if the living room was its new home. Alas, the shelf I had just spent the last fifteen minutes maneuvering was destined for my office on the second floor. I would have to keep going. And I did. After some plotting, I finally ducked my shoulder inside the shelf, stood up straight, and literally pulled myself up the stairs by the railing. Was it the safest thing I’ve ever done? Definitely not. Honestly, the whole venture was pretty precarious, and I would have been in some serious trouble if I’d slipped. On the other hand…

It felt damn good to remember that while I have been relying on someone, I don’t necessarily need to rely on someone. I’ve been feeling quite keenly the devastation of my own broken circle, and the massive gap sometimes seems impossible to shrink, let alone close up. It was empowering to feel even the tiniest sliver of a shard fall back into place. I’m not about to declare triumph over my struggles or anything—I’m nowhere near that—but I do smirk a little every time I walk into my office and see that shelf.

It’s a start.

Lesson of the Day: You’re stronger than you think—channel your inner Hulk!

Looking Out for #1

Society has drummed into us that “selfish” is a dirty word. From an early age, we’re taught to share our toys, put others’ feelings before our own, and give our time and money to worthy people and causes. Somewhere between letting our little brothers play with our favorite matchbox car and donating $50 to the Red Cross, we have lost the ability to take care of ourselves without a lingering sense of guilt.

That knee-jerk guilt reaction is something I have had to get over in the last several months. Selfishness, I have learned, is not something to be shoved shamefully into a dark corner. Instead, it is a lifeline to my sanity. I have always been good at taking care of others. I’ve been called a nurturer by many family members and friends, and I’ve always enjoyed the label. I like making other people happy, and I like knowing that my friends and family trust that they can come to me, day or night, if they need anything. Taking care of myself has always been an afterthought, as I never felt any real cause to do so—I’m usually content if those around me are, and I’ve never truly been in a situation where I had to monitor my own emotions so closely. Until now.

So, one aspect of The Reinvention Project involves a resolution of sorts: to put myself first, to address my needs, and to let the rest of the world handle itself for a while. In a word, to be selfish. I don’t mean that I’ve cut myself off from the world’s problems, or that I ignore those family and friends who come to me. Rather, I have simply moved myself to the top of my list of priorities. It’s not an easy thing for me to do, and I’m willing to bet that if you look at your own list of priorities, you may not even make the top five.

How am I going about fulfilling this resolution? It’s been simpler than I ever imagined, and in fact, most of the time it’s something so small that I am amazed I never did it before. For instance, I’ll light candles in my living room while I’m studying in the evening—I love candlelight; I find it incredibly relaxing. I guiltlessly set aside time to watch my favorite TV shows (Dirty Jobs, MythBusters, Bones, and Ghost Whisperer) when they’re on—no TiVo, no DVR. I do Tae Bo to keep my body feeling good. In direct contrast to Tae Bo, I will sometimes have ice cream for dinner (a useful life formula? Chocolate = Win). Basically, I give myself permission to do what makes me happy, sometimes regardless of what I feel I should be doing (cleaning, studying, sleeping). It has helped me find some measure of happiness for myself when everything else seems woefully unhappy in my life. And that is more important than anything else I “should” be attending to.

Lesson of the Day: To thine own self be attentive.

Taking Stock

It’s so easy to get caught up in the flow of time, to let it carry us along, never fighting the current and never using it to our advantage, simply…existing. Before we know it days have gone by, then weeks, then months, then an entire year. We look back, trying to remember where the time went, but can only remember the highlights, good or bad, that help make up what is now the past. Entire stretches of our lives are blank to us, never to be recovered, and we shrug our shoulders and move on, perhaps regretful, perhaps determined to be more aware in the future.

Taking stock of my life is an exercise I am engaged in with tiring frequency these days. I say “tiring” because I have come to the conclusion that we humans are simply not equipped to be aware of every second of our cosmically short lives. The fluidity with which we move through the majority of our time on earth makes what we do remember all the sweeter, all the more important. Everyone resolves, at some point, to stop letting life pass them by. But isn’t that the nature of time? It moves completely independent of our wishes, our desires, our hopes, our dreams. It soldiers on, in a forward direction, deaf to our pleas for it to slow down, speed up, stop entirely. For all our technological advances, no one has yet figured out a way to control the rotation of the earth, to stop the changing of the seasons, to alter the flow of the universe.

So time passes, and our lives pass, and we are not always aware of it, and I really believe that’s how it’s meant to be. Constant life analysis is for philosophers, and while I do, in fact, have a degree in philosophy, I never planned on using it in quite so personal a manner. But, having said all that, such introspection has its place. Like when one is trying to rebuild one’s life. So, I found myself doing quite a bit of analyzing this week. A lot of it was tangible—walking around my house, contemplating new furniture placement, filling in the holes that having certain items removed left. Or going through boxes and bins, determining what I would like to keep with me when I eventually move elsewhere, what I’d like to donate, what might be better served in someone else’s hands. What do I need in terms of material comforts? What do I want?

In my current state of mind, taking the leap from the tangible to the intangible is more like stepping over a crack in a sidewalk. What do I need in terms of mental and emotional comforts? What do I want? These two questions are harder to answer, and far more important than determining how many serving spoons I’d like to keep in my kitchen drawer. I can’t say I have any answers to either question, but I know there are things I already have that fill those categories, and I am painfully aware that there are things lacking that I will eventually have to acknowledge.

The above two questions, I think, are the ones we should address when we determine to “be more aware” of the passage of time. How many hours pass that find us unhappy, malcontent, or apathetic? How many days pass that find us resigned to just making it through, hoping that the next day will somehow be better? When did we become passive participants in our own lives? Until we are aware of what we want and need, we have no hope of becoming whoever we’re truly meant to be, and we certainly can’t improve our situations. It’s a lesson I’ve had forcefully thrust upon me. I’m not saying anyone should become a philosopher—they’re not, as a rule, a happy lot—but if you ask yourself what you need and what you want and you either can’t answer or perhaps have too many unfulfilled answers, well, the next question to yourself might be: what am I waiting for?

Lesson of the Day: Knowing thyself doesn’t make the world go ‘round, but it might fill in some of the blanks!

Holding On...and Letting Go

I came home from vacation on Sunday to a house that looked as if someone had come in and taken half of everything residing in it. The scene was no surprise; this supposed pillaging of my worldly goods was actually part of an agreement attached to one of the situations that prompted The Reinvention Project. I have had weeks to prepare for this sight, and it was about as disconcerting as I expected it to be. As I wandered through rooms, feeling melancholy, taking stock of what was no longer there, I thought to myself, “I didn’t even say goodbye to this stuff. I didn’t take a moment, before I left, to look at everything one last time.”

And that was when I stopped and took stock of myself instead. Because I was right—I didn’t say goodbye to the stuff I knew wouldn’t be around when I got back. I didn’t give any of it a second glance. So why, when I already have so many other negative emotions floating around in my psyche, was I getting all glum over a missing coffee table? If my instinct as I passed these objects for the final time wasn’t to linger over them, why linger over their memories now?

A large part of creating my new life, I suspect, is going to involve learning what in my old life needs to be held on to, and what needs to be let go. And I learned my very first lesson Sunday night: coffee tables, artwork, and queen-sized mattresses are firmly in the “let go” category. Now, I have a feeling that, among all the things I will be faced with distinguishing, material objects will be among the most easily categorized. Still, I have to start somewhere, and why not with the Native American pottery bought in Sedona five years ago?

As I begin this long journey, I know just enough to know that the majority of my victories are going to be small steps toward my ultimate goal. And if not crying over the fact that my dining room table and chairs are gone is the highlight of my day, so be it. After all, it’s just furniture—besides, I bought something new to replace them. A handy metaphor dropped right into my lap, to be sure.

On the flip side, knowing what to hold on to can be just as important as knowing what to let go. Case in point, last night found me sitting in one of the common areas of the university where I am getting my master’s degree. My education has been the aspect of my life least affected by the chaos that surrounds me these days. I have, however, had to give much thought to whether I would complete my degree at my current school, attempt to transfer somewhere else, or give up on it entirely (to be picked up again at a later date—or not). It is difficult to convey the slew of emotions that came with such ponderings. Learning is something I adore, and something I am unabashedly good at. I waited years to go back to school, holding off until the time felt right. Furthermore, the degree I am working on will give me an advantage in future career prospecting. All in all, being in school can only lead to a happier, more well-rounded, more successful me.

So, when faced with the distinct possibility of having to give up what has, essentially, been a dream of mine for years, even temporarily, it took a surprisingly short amount of time to come up with my answer: hell no. Sometimes, when everything else in life seems to be going downhill (and taking you with it), it’s important to grab on to the sturdiest branch you can find and hold on tight. That, for me, is a piece of paper with “M.A.” on it. No, I will not transfer. No, I will not drop out. No, I will not postpone. My education is one thing from my old life that will not be going away, and will not be modified. It’s coming along for the ride, hence my position last night on a cheap wooden chair, sitting at a slightly wobbly table, waiting for the first class of the quarter to begin. Ah, higher education.

Lesson of the Day: Any port in a storm, but be prepared to let go of the boat!