Permission

I know that I've written before that I am going to work on giving myself permission to do the things that I want to do and not beat myself up for it later.  I have to report that, so far, I have been unable to accomplish that.  Yesterday, I did two things that were purely selfish (one that I occasionally do and one that I rarely do) and I then look around at all of the things that I should have done instead.  I took myself to see a movie (it's a movie that I saw a couple of weeks ago but there was a lot in it and I wanted to see it again on the big screen while I still had the opportunity) and I then took myself out to eat.  I was okay while I was at the movies but I felt out of place at the restaurant.

When I got to the restaurant, there were quite a few people there and the staff at the check-in podium were passing out the little buzzer things.  I made my way to the podium to check myself in where they told me it would be about a 30 minute wait for a table for one.  I told the hostess that was fine with me and her response was, "really?  You're going to wait for 30 minutes or more by yourself?"  While her response kind of took my aback, I told her again that I was willing to wait for a table and I did.  The wait was longer than expected (so I was glad I had a book with me) and when I was finally seated, I felt as if the patrons in the section I was seated in were looking at me sitting there alone (and I'm sure they weren't and I'm just being sensitive/paranoid).  The food was good (not as good as I really wanted it to be but it was still good) but I do feel as if I made a fool out of myself in front of the waiter.  He was very good looking and I found myself nervous/tongue tied when he would come to the table to ask how things were.  One of the times, he came up behind me (catching me completely off guard) and asked how the food was; like a moron, I answered that everything was "beautiful;" as soon as it came out of my mouth I wanted to pull the words back into my mouth and hide in a hole.  I guess this experience just shows me that I might need to do this more often (even if it's just to continue to educate myself in the art of intelligent conversation with people I don't know).

As I was driving home from the restaurant, the sky was clear and the moon was gorgeous!  Seeing the shine in the sky so brightly, reminded me of a quote from one of my all time favorite movies.  I am a sucker for the movie Practical Magic and can heavily identify with the character of Sally (played by Sandra Bullock).  The scene I was reminded of is where she is writing the letter to her sister.  She writes, 

Sometimes I feel like there's a hole inside of me, an emptiness that at times seems to burn. I think if you lifted my heart to your ear, you could probably hear the ocean. The moon tonight, there's a circle around it. Sign of trouble not far behind. I have this dream of being whole. Of not going to sleep each night, wanting. But still sometimes, when the wind is warm or the crickets sing... I dream of a love that even time will lie down and be still for. I just want someone to love me. I want to be seen. I don't know. Maybe I had my happiness. I don't want to believe it but, there is no man, Gilly. Only that moon.

I don't know if there was a circle around the moon or anything like that last night but there are times where I feel as if I've had enough circles around the moon to last me for quite some time.  I know that I have to learn to take things in stride and as they come and maybe along with that is working on my armor again.  I had thought I was doing well by removing pieces of it but I feel as if I need to put it back on in order to protect myself.  On the other hand, maybe I need to continue to remove the armor completely (even though I really don't feel ready to do that!) in order to grow as an individual.

One of the ways I am growing as an individual is I bought myself a cookbook this past week.  My parents bought me a really cool cookbook for Christmas and I bought one of the companion books.  I really am trying to make progress along my quest to find myself even if it's just learning one of the basics such as cooking.  I have successfully made some of the recipes in the cookbook Mom and Dad gave me and one of the ones in the newest book so I guess that is progress on one level.

Well, my dear readers, since I've been writing about giving myself permission, I am going to give myself permission to bring this to a close for the evening and curl up under a blanket on the couch with my dogs.  I have been freezing this evening and I'm hoping that I'm not coming down with something (even though it's going around work).  I'm going to drink plenty of orange juice and try and get some rest tonight.  I hope you're able to do the same!

New habits

I have been trying very hard this week to not look for contingency plans however, there have been times where it has been too easy for me to fall into those old habits.  Along with all of that, I have also been trying to not beat myself up when I do slip into those old habits.  I know that it will take time to create new habits and I will just have to keep trying to encourage myself to find those new habits.

One of the new habits that emerged is when I was out running errands this weekend, I happened to look at an end-cap display at one of the stores (which is something I try and avoid because you tend to then buy things you wouldn't normally from those displays and that's why they're there) and a wall hanging caught my eye.  The wall hanging was the only one of its kind from what I could see so I bought it (and while I'm sure they'll have it in stock again, I didn't want to necessarily take the chance of when that might be).  The surprising thing about me selecting this particular wall hanging as one to bring home it it's an inspirational wall hanging.  Now you may be surprised by that since I am often very cynical but the saying on it spoke to me and I think it's something that I need to have hanging on my wall.  At this point, you may be wondering what the wall hanging said...  Well, I'll tell you...  =)

Take PRIDE in how far you have come & FAITH in how far you will go.

People have told me this along my quest and I figure it's about time I have a visual reminder of it that I can see each and every day.  The colors in the wall hanging match the color scheme in my bathroom so I'm going to hang it on the wall there so I can see it every day as I'm getting ready for work and I can see it before I go to bed each night.  I know that the challenge for me will be to not only read the words but to also learn how to apply them to my everyday life.  We'll just have to wait and see how that goes for me...

One of the (many) places I would like to learn how to apply this saying is in my dancing.  I am very much so my own worst critic when it comes to any of my dance opportunities.  I had a performance last night and I once again felt the need to tear it apart move by move.  People in the audience (both dancers and non-dancers) told me that I did a good job but I just felt as if my movements were rusty (I haven't really danced other than to practice the occasional move for the past almost 3 weeks).  Now I do take responsibility for not rehearsing but that will change as of tomorrow since the studio will reopen in order to prepare for a really important dance performance.  One of the reasons why I haven't been rehearsing (or working out) as I should be is I was trying to rest my joints in the hope they would heal.  Hopefully diving back into intense rehearsals starting tomorrow won't make things hurt again since I'm starting to feel better...

Tomorrow I get to have the day off of work but I will spend it studying.  Through work I have had an opportunity to attend a two day class (had class one this past week and class two this coming week) and the class this week has three parts -- we have to give a lecture, do a skills assessment and then a written test.  I am trying really had not to come up with a contingency plan and "what if" everything to death (have done it some by worrying about what might happen if I do a poor job with the presentations, if I fail the test, etc).  I guess all I really can do is study hard and prepare as best as I can before going to the class and then do the best job I can with each of the portions of the day.

Well, since I have a day full of studying ahead of me, I should probably shut this down for tonight and think about heading to bed.  Have a great week, dear readers and I hope we can all remember to Take PRIDE in how far you have come & FAITH in how far you will go.  =)

Contingency plan

I am starting to discover (for myself and with the wonderful guidance of my parents) that I can't have a contingency plan for every situation -- no matter how hard I would like to be able to.  Granted, I don't want to know everything my future holds because that would be boring.  I would, however, like to feel as if I have some things figured out for "just in case."  And part of me really does know that's an unrealistic expectation....

I think part of the reason that I would like to feel as if I have some contingency plans in place (for those "just in case" moments) is because I was blindsided by my divorce and there was no contingency plan. I never expected to get divorced so why would I have a plan for if it happened?  I'm not saying that things still wouldn't have caught me off-guard (which they did) or hurt (which I have never felt that kind of pain in my life before) but a contingency plan would have helped in the sense of having an inkling what to do with myself when it did happen.  However, as I sit here thinking about it, maybe if I had a contingency plan I wouldn't be open to something unexpected that is even better than my plan...

I know that there are a lot of unknown factors that are beyond my control and in those instances even if I had a contingency plan it would do me no good.  I guess one of the things that I need to do is work on being okay with not having everything figured out and to learn how to "go with the flow" (any suggestions would be appreciated/helpful).  "Going with the flow" is not something that I have necessarily been good with (as I'm sure you've been able to tell if you've been following my blog for any amount of time) and I think I need to start learning how to work on this and letting go of some of that control.  That, in and of itself, is going to be a challenge for me.

Maybe one of the things that I need to work on is finding one thing each day that I can't change and be okay with that.  Even if it's just something as simple as being okay with hitting a red light if I'm running late.  And rather than focusing on what things may/may not go wrong daily or with certain situations, it might help me to try and at least take things at face value instead of thinking that I need a contingency plan ahead of time to protect myself.  If I think about it, actually learning how to let go might be one of the best things I can do to grow as an individual...  If only I knew how/where to start said process...

I guess one of the things that I could say is I didn't have a contingency plan when going to Jury Duty this last week and I survived.  Granted, all I had to do was sit there because I was not one of the individuals selected but still.  I even went outside my comfort zone and talked to 5 people who were also there for Jury Duty (that is a BIG accomplishment for me because I would have been perfectly content to just sit there and keep to myself).  We'll see if I'll be able to do the same when it comes to this upcoming week -- I have two training sessions to attend this week.  I will try my best not to create/solidify any contingency plans this week.  Wish me luck...

Working on me... again....

Well, my dear readers, tomorrow I have to face yet another unknown on my life's quest and have to face appearing for jury duty.  The summons appeared while I was on vacation (of course) and I will have to be there to report first thing tomorrow morning.  I realize that it's my civic duty to report and to do my part in the justice system if it is asked of me....  However, because it is something that I haven't faced before and I'm not 100% sure where I'm going, I am very nervous about reporting for said civic duty.  Part of me says that I should look at it as just another adventure on my quest to fabulousness (yes, I have made up yet another word because I'm wondering if that's the quest that I'm on...) but I am having some trouble looking at it that way.  Maybe I can change that around before tomorrow morning; we'll see.

I was rereading some of my old posts and I realize that I was unable to accomplish one of the major things that I wanted to last year...  I wanted to work on myself and not spending so much time worrying about the needs/wants of other people.  I spent lots of time/energy/effort worrying about other people and what they need from me.  In looking back at that, I realize that I am exhausted from doing so.  I am exhausted both emotionally and physically (because I haven't slept as well as I should because of worrying about other people) and I know that I need to change some things in order to work on myself.  If you've read other posts that I've written, you know that's a scary concept for me.

I've spent so much time trying to help other people that I've met along the way that I feel as if I've once again lost myself along the way.  I don't like feeling as if I have to disappear in order to help those around me.  I feel as if I've been working too hard on myself to either vanish or to mold myself once again into the person that someone else wants for me to be.  Believe me, I know that I'm not perfect and that I have never been perfect but what's wrong with me?  I have to get to the point that I'm okay with who I am and who I want to be.  I have to become secure enough with who that is so when situations like this arise, I don't question who I am in order to help others.

Something else that I would like to do more of in the new year is to celebrate even my smallest (even if they're silly) accomplishments.  Yesterday, for example, I checked the air pressure in the tires on my car and filled them to the pressure they were supposed to be at (the little light on the dashboard had turned on to tell me that the car was complaining about the tire pressure).  I used the air machine at the gas station (because of course I had to top off the gas tank as well since it was pretty low) and luckily I had the quarters needed in order to make the machine work.  I had never used one of those machines and had to determine which hose I needed (since it was the machine that was for both air and water).  After I made sure I had the right hose, I proceeded to fill up the tires.  Even though I'm sure I looked silly fighting with the hose to get it to go around my car all the way, I did what I needed to do and I felt accomplished.

Today I did something else for myself and I found out that my printer had wireless printing capabilities and I could hook up one of my electronic devices to print documents.  I didn't know that I could do that so I was pretty excited!  See, sometimes it's the silly things that have to be celebrated -- no matter how small or silly.  =)

Well, dear readers, I hope you have a week full of positive adventures.  For myself, I'm going to sign off and make sure I have the correct directions in order to report for jury duty tomorrow.  Wish me luck!