I am grateful that while I’ve been really behind all week both personally and professionally, I feel okay this week and feel a sense of calm.
And I really cherish this feeling. Knowing that I will catch up, I’ll read all my email, and then there will be more email and I’ll read that too.
I generally feel a sense of overwhelm and self-disappointment when I am in a place like this, so I am very grateful that I appear to be giving myself grace and that I am dialing into book club instead of feverishly doing email at night.
Yes to doing the best I can and yes to creating boundaries.
I have a sign on my desk that says “We can do hard things.” It’s from Glennon Doyle and I love looking at it every day.
Over the years I’ve learned that different things are hard for different people. And that sometimes big things are really easy for me and small things are really hard.
Today I did a bunch of those small things. Getting paperwork ready for a passport renewal, sending off tuition payments, and other paperwork. Calling to cancel things or to change service. Booking a small getaway. The small daily tasks are overwhelming and hard for me.
I find myself postponing them again and again and feeling the dread of them permanently sitting in my to-do list. So today I booked some time on my calendar and gone it all done in one shot. And now I feel that overwhelming relief of getting to cross off those things from my list.
I remember my sixteenth birthday. I even remember what I wore for my sweet sixteen party.
He was the only one of us who hadn’t had a pandemic birthday and now he gets to have that honor, too.
I am so incredibly proud of this boy and the person he’s becoming. He’s always had an unwavering sense of self and still does now. We are just lucky to get to do life with him.
Happy birthday sweet boy! We love you so incredibly much.
It’s amazing how much life can seem like it will never change and yet so much changes all the time.
Today, I was reading some of the journaling I did when I taught fifth grade in the Bronx back in 2002/3. At the time I was really struggling and it felt like life would never stop being miserable.
Similarly, when the big boy was born, he wouldn’t sleep for more than 45 minutes at a time. Month after month, we got delirious with lack of sleep. It felt like it would never end.
I can remember so many of these instances. And yet they each ended. Every single one of them.
This pandemic will end, too. We will get to the other side of this, we will resume life and create a new normal, we will grow and change and adapt to a new life and this will feel like all the other things we’ve endured. A painful but distant memory.
Because change is the only constant in our lives.
Yes to being here now and yes to knowing that this phase of life is transient. Here’s to hoping we make it through as safely as possible.
Little boy decided he wanted to play card games today. So he taught me this game. It’s a speed game and we had to play it so fast that it was not possible to not laugh each time. So we raced, we giggled and we played again and again. Laughing so hard that I was crying.
It was the best part of the day.
Yes to laughter. Yes to togetherness. Yes to saying yes.
I feel like some weeks fly by and other weeks just drag and drag. And I walk into some Fridays relaxed and present and others are just a mess. I feel like this Friday came kicking and screaming and I spent most of my day trying to re-ground myself and recover from the mess that was this week
But recover I did
I had the conversations I needed to have and the conversations I was scared to have. I did most of my work. And then I just decided it was time to take care of me. So I exercised and did some yoga and decided it was time to rest in a bath.
Now I feel grounded and much more peaceful than I did this morning. I still have too much email sitting in my inbox and at some point I will have to clear it up. But I think I made the right choices today. And I’m grateful to have had the space to make that possible.
Yes to showing up for ourselves. Yes to doing what we need. Yes to connecting.
Some of the days are tougher. Today was a tough day at work and I am letting myself feel that because saying yes is also about feeling my feelings.
And yes I also got to connect with a close college friend with whom I hadn’t chatted with in at least 6 years. Between that and my morning chat with my friend Kelly, I am grateful for good friends and for friends whom you can neglect for years and then chat with as if no time passed at all. So thankful for friends like that. So thankful for friends in general.
Yes to feeling what is. Yes to friends. Yes oh yes to good friends.
Wednesdays are hard. Today my first meeting was 8am and my last meeting ended at 8pm. In the middle there, I had to go get groceries, put them all away, cook some food for the week and now it’s 8:37 and I feel beat.
I noticed this last Wednesday so this week I chose to exercise in the morning instead and now I am tired but I am grateful for the decision I made this morning to get out of bed and exercise.
The evening me is thanking the morning me.
I think paying attention to the flow of the days, hours, weeks and months is something I haven’t done enough of and when I do I see benefits pretty quickly. There’s so much good in going with the flow vs trying to swim upstream.
Yes to paying attention and yes to working with what is.
To ensure I can keep my word close all year, I take @aliedwards One Little Word class. It’s a class that has monthly prompts to help keep your word front and center.
The February prompt is one of my favorites. It’s to make a vision board and this month is led by the magical @lucrecer who is so inspiring.
I used to do this project by hand but I don’t own any magazines and it is challenging for me to find images so a few years ago I decided to use pinterest to collect images and quotes that are meaningful for me and then use them to make a digital collage.
I love doing this process each year and a huge side benefit is that I can then print it and glue it to my journals throughout the year. But the best part, for me, is that I also make it the background and screensaver for my computers. Since I am on the computer all the time for work, I get to see and be inspired by my word all day long.
I love having all the layers and discovering some detail each time I look.
Yes to being inspired. Yes to creating tangible reminders of my word. Yes to connecting with why I wanted yes as my word and what I want to say yes to in my life!
Today was the second day of my 100 day project. Since I am already doing year of yes here, I started @karenikadoeswellness just to track that particular project which is more about focusing on different types of what I consider to be wellness for the next 100 days.
I looked over my list yesterday as I was asking my friend Kelly for more ideas on things to feed my soul. And she suggested listening to more classical music or opera and lighting candles. So this morning I put on some Pavarotti, lit a delicious candle, and journaled.
It was the most excellent way to start my day. It filled my soul up all the way.
Yes to music, yes to journaling and yes to focusing on wellness. Thank you Kelly!
After taking almost all of January off, hubby and I went climbing again today. The rock we usually climb on has three faces (at least if you don’t want to be near anyone, which we don’t). One face is super easy, and we did it many times last year, the other one is our most recent route that we’ve done 3-4 times and the third we’d never done before today.
When we got there, others were already doing the route we usually do, so we got adventurous and did the third face we’d never done. This required taking our shoes off and crossing a small river. Very cold water.
It also required just going for it and seeing what we could do since we had no idea what the rating was and if we would be able to climb it.
But we did. Several times.
It was hard, refreshing, invigorating. On the way home, we got to see an incredible sunset and I was feeling a deep sense of contentment and joy.
Fresh air, new adventures, exercise, and time with my husband. A perfect afternoon.
Yes to adventures. Yes to trying new things and taking chances. Yes to time together. Yes to nature.
I’m finding that so much of saying yes is about letting things go. Especially my thoughts and random attachments to things having to be a certain way. I’m paying attention to the judgemental, worried, and angry voices in my head. And then instead of reacting because I assume they must be right, I am choosing to slow down and notice them.
And then, if I can do that, then I can question them. Do I really believe that? Is that really true? Must it be that way?
Questioning these assumptions, judgements, default states has been very enlightening. I am noticing all sorts of things about myself.
And then I am gently trying to let them go. One at a time.
I am more successful with some than others but I am still grateful for the noticing. One step at a time.
Yes to letting things go. Yes to paying attention. Yes to grace. Yes yes yes.
