Are we really only 13 days into this year? How is that even possible? All those posts from early last week where things were calm and quiet are moot now. This week has been hectic, intense and jam-packed.
I know that juggling home and work and pandemic and kids’ schedules is hard and it’s been for me, too. But I also have worked from home for ten years while my little one was 0-10 and had just barely transitioned to working from the office when covid shut our lives down.
One of the advantages of of all that time was spending not just quality but volume of time together with my kids and really connecting with who they are, their values, and the things that matter to them. As a result, I feel a deep connection with my kids and I really enjoy the privilege of getting to share so much of their lives. Of course I would prefer that they go to school and experience a more typical childhood, interacting with their cohort all day long, but if I have to be stuck at home with anyone, I am grateful to be stuck with my people.
Love them so much.
Yes to family and yes to being there for the struggles, for the minutia and for the laughter. Always for the laughter.
Today was insane. I had back to back meetings but I was especially amazed at how much context switching I had to do all day. At some point in my day, I stepped back and thought about how in the last few hours I talked about 9 different topics at work, talked to each kid about their day and classes, ordered groceries for pickup later this week, on and off worked on a presentation for tomorrow am, prepped for book club tonight, wrote a letter to the head of my kids’ school, and replied to a parent in my younger son’s class.
I find that the hardest part of my life right now is the sheer number of things I am switching between. And one of the things I need to spend some time on is making that list and being intentional about the role I want to play in each of those scenarios. I feel like a lot of what I do now is do whatever’s needed. As opposed to being super intentional about my priorities, how I can best grow and how I can best serve.
So this long weekend I plan to take a step back, make a list and take a good long look at how I can be intentional.
Today went by in a blur. Back to back meetings and no time to breathe in between. And now it’s 7pm and I am really tired and don’t feel like doing anything productive.
This is one reason I usually try to wake up early and pay myself first. Before the day has begun is the best time to do my personal work. Journaling, sketching, exercising.
The thing is, I’ve been having a lot of trouble waking up early in the morning lately. 8am is the earliest I can do, which is way too late to get anything productive done.
So my plan is to start going to bed earlier. Or force myself to wake up earlier for a few days so I can start getting tired earlier and reset my days.
I can’t tell if this need to hibernate in the mornings is a winter thing but I know that it makes me considerably more ineffective. And I also know that days I don’t pay myself down, I am definitely not the best version of myself. So here’s to hoping it works.
Weekly Intention: Since this is my first “real” week back to work, my intention this week is to try to make sure I can maintain a bit of the quiet and peace I still have in my head. And maybe to try and turn off the non-stop CNN.
This month’s intention is:January: Yes to Baby Steps: Start small. Make a plan for the steps you want to take and give yourself a lot of grace. Take a handful of steps. You got this. I like this. I’ve been thinking about this in the context of self-care. How can I take some baby steps? Last week, it was the smoothies, what can I do this week?
One way I will leap this week: I have a conversation scheduled today, depending on the outcome of that, I might be leaping. So i guess one way I’ll leap this week is showing up to that conversation.
One boundary I will set this week: I will not work at night. I plan to do more walks, take more wind-down time.
One area where I will go deeper this week: I am still thinking about what I plan to do for my 100-day project this year. So I will spend some time on that this week.
What do I need to sit with this week? I need to journal this week. I can tell that my head is full and yet I seem to be resisting it for reasons unknown.
I am looking forward to: having a long weekend this coming weekend.
Focus onCore Desired Feelings (lighter, kinder, enough, magic, wild): I think if I start journaling I will feel lighter. If I turn off CNN, I will be kinder. I want to remember that I have enough money saved to buy some of the necessities I have. The magic of this week will be potentially setting up ethernet. And I am hoping that I will climb in the wild some time this week!
This week’s challenges: I have some challenging conversations to have at work and some choices I need to make.
Top Goals:
Work: talk to L, make a decision on presentation, prep for presentation
Personal: I want to start journaling this week. That’s my top goal.
Family: Support the kids as they start their first real week.
This week, I want to remember: That it’s all going to be ok. Nothing matters as much as I make it matter. And things will work out.
As we close out the first week of 2021 (can it really be that it’s just been one week??) I have been thinking about all the things that happened in this one week. The huge, terrible things and the small wonderful things.
I am trying to take a moment to celebrate the small wins. To celebrate the moments we found equilibrium, the moments we got to hear a yes when we expected a no, the moments we got to hug each other or laugh together.
Part of choosing yes this year was sitting with what is and not trying to resist it. And that takes so much practice. There is so much internalized and external noise in how things “should” be so when they aren’t that way, there is so much judgement. I am trying to cut through the noise and see if I can find my own internal truth. What matters most to me. I am trying to connect with my own values and choices. So I can let go of others’ shoulds and build a life that is meaningful to me.
Here’s to paying attention to the conversations in my head so I can discern the difference and let go of the noise that’s not mine to carry.
Yes to listening. Yes to living my own truth and my own life.
The Best Part of this Week: The best part of this week that I had intentionally blocked out my calendar for the week because I wasn’t sure if I would be working or not. That created a very slow transition to work this week and made it much nicer.
I celebrate: N getting his shiny machine working. D getting into advanced photography and J starting his LLC. Good week!
I am grateful for: The morning smoothie I’ve started drinking that is full of vegetables and good nutrition.
This week, I exercised: I am still off the bike because of severe sciatica (which is healing thankfully!) so I’ve done 3 arms, one pilates, one core, and one yoga class. I’ve also done two stretching classes. One more week and I hope to be back on the bike. Cross fingers.
This week, I said yes to: Resting. Going slow.
I said no to: adding last minute meetings.
I honored my values (love, learn, peace, service, gratitude): I’ve been thinking a lot about my values and what it means to love someone and how everyone’s peace looks different and how I can serve the people I love and how much more I have to learn and all that I am grateful for. Much of this is on my mind lately and I am learning to reprogram the tapes in my head.
My mood this week was: I have been incredibly distressed with all that’s happening this week. I am angry and sad and disappointed.
I am proud of: I’ve been paying attention to my thoughts and doing a lot of self-work in my head lately. I am proud of being able to pause enough to notice my toxic thoughts. I know it won’t always be so.
I release: I release all of what’s making me anxious at this moment. All of the things I constantly find myself worrying about. All the balls I dropped. Tomorrow I get to start over.
Here’s what I learned this week: I learned a lot of facts about sleep this week and how crucial and needed it is.
I seem to still be moving slowly and not feeling inspired to do much. Instead of panicking I am trying to choose to say yes to what is and be here for it.
I spent the day reading two books, roasting veggies, and finally taking a bath after ten years of not being able to. It was bliss to sit in the warm water and close my eyes and just be here.
In the last week, I’ve been paying attention to random anxious thoughts that pop up ( and there have been many ) and challenging myself to do real-time CBT on myself. Naming it out loud when I am catastrophizing, etc. I am also putting myself on the spot and asking what the worst possible outcome could be and what the best possible outcome could be and really calling myself out to be here and follow the strain of thought to its end.
It’s been helpful more often than not.
Yes to slowing down. Yes to grace. Yes to naming anxious thoughts and yes to being present to it. Yes to life.
I am still obsessively watching CNN and still full of rage and deep sorrow. And I decided that for today I will talk about something else because I can’t talk about what is going on without ranting.
A few years ago I decided to permanently stop dieting. I spent a too-large part of my life dieting and there’s incontrovertible proof that diets don’t work and they are harmful so a few years ago I decided to permanently stop trying to diet.
Walking into this year, one of the things I want to do better is the nutrition I get. I think sleep, exercise and nutrition is the trifecta that helps me feel better and live longer.
I don’t have too many bad habits but I do drink a lot of diet coke and eat chocolate too often. Instead of focusing on removing or reducing things which felt both hard and punishing at this moment, I decided to start by adding things.
I decided I wanted to add more veggies into my life. Just that for now. And I’ve gotten lost in the smoothie/protein shake world before so I am not doing that again.
Instead, I now blend half a bag of spinach, water+ice, and two oranges and one spoon of chia seeds. And then little boy and I split the drink each morning.
I can then eat whatever more breakfast I want. This is not a replacement breakfast. It’s just a guarantee that I get some greens first thing before my day gets too busy to eat well. And it tastes delicious!
Yes to adding more greens and yes to not punishing myself. Yes to being gentle with progress.
Honestly I am still watching CNN incessantly and not in a place where I can have optimistic thoughts. I don’t want to talk about anything. I had more meetings today so I muted the TV occasionally but it’s been playing in the background nonstop.
I am not sure what I am expecting by watching it nonstop. I know it just keeps my anxiety level high. And I have the luxury of turning it off. But I guess I am not ready to ignore things yet. I want to feel this. I think it’s important to sit with the discomfort of what’s going on.
So still saying yes to that.
Maybe it’s a mistake but it’s how I feel at the moment so I am honoring it.
I had such lovely plans to write about things this morning. I saw this magnificent sunrise this morning and I was going to write about habits and shifting them with the seasons. I was going to write about veggies and finding ways to add more of them to my diet. I half-wrote those posts in my mind this morning.
And then things went to shit.
I had CNN on, I was watching the counting of the electoral votes and listening to the Arizona objections when insanity started happening and I had to check and recheck that the news was still showing the US and not some other country.
I grew up in a third world country. I grew up looking up to America, aspiring to be an American. Trusting and respecting and striving for the ideals that America represented. And while I’ve learned a lot in the last twenty years that has disappointed me, I still would not want to live in any other country. I love this country. And today, I was completely heartbroken, deeply disappointed, and full of rage.
I can write pages and pages but here’s what I am feeling the most: I do not plan to move on and forget about what happened, I do not plan to numb it because it’s unpleasant. I do not take the privilege of being an American citizen for granted. I worked incredibly hard for over 10 years to earn this and I will not squander it for a moment.
So yes to feeling and seeing and owning what happened today and yes to showing up again and again to ensure it will never happen again.
I had regular goals for my blog for the last few years and that worked well for me until last October when I just gave everything up. At this point, I am not yet sure how I feel about 2021 and the blog so I don’t want to prematurely commit to things. But here are a few things I might like to try:
Art: I really enjoyed drawing for my book instagram account last year and might want to pick that back up, not sure what other art plans I have
Reflection: Monday and Sunday reflection posts helped me stay connected to my goals, keep track of my intentions, I will see if I can bring those back.
Storytelling: Stories from 2020 started out strong but like last year, I quit. This year, I did post short passages on my personal instagram account and I am thinking of continuing that for 2021 possibly. If so, that would be a bit of our storytelling. I also will continue to have Ali’s kits and use those to tell our stories.
Reading – I read like a lot this year. I continued to read netgalley books as well as audiobooks from the library and audible. I plan to continue this next year. I will continue tracking them on goodreads.
Until October, 2020 was going ok but I haven’t missed blogging so I am not sure if I will do any or all of these but we will see. All of these might happen, none of them might happen. I might repeat projects. I might do wildly different things. I am giving myself grace while trying to keep myself motivated.
Here’s to a wonderful 2021. Here’s to doing more art. Here’s to making time to enjoy art. Here’s to learning new things. Here’s to practicing more. Here’s to reflecting. Being intentional. Creating a positive cycle. Here’s to saying yes.
I couldn’t decide if I was planning to work this week or not so I blocked off my calendar before we all disappeared in December. I didn’t know it then but it might be the smartest decision I made in 2020.
This morning I decided that I would go back to work slowly. I have a daily meeting with my manager and I decided I would attend that and pretty much nothing else. So today, instead of my usual 10 hours of meetings, I had 2 hours of meetings. It meant that I could:
– stay on top of my incoming mail – send some emails to do work – eat lunch – plan some of the work that is coming – exercise – stay calm and spacious all day
It was the most incredible start to the year. And I plan for it to be this way all week!
I might have to make a tradition of this every year. In fact, maybe I will do a week like this every 6 weeks or so to cleanse and catch up.
Yes to ramping up slowly. Yes to creating more space. Yes yes yes.
