Don't mind the sawdust...

I saw a sign this past week that said, "Don't mind the sawdust; this circus is under renovations."  After seeing the sign, it struck me that my own circus needs some renovations, too.  I know I've written about it before but I need to do something - the clowns/acrobats/animals/trapeze-ists/trainers/everyone else are tire and they need some semblance of a change of pace.  Going non-stop at at a breakneck pace will take a toll on the best of us and this particular ringmaster (me) is just plain tired...

I have been traveling yet another week and I am not looking forward to heading back into work tomorrow.  I got back to may apartment late last night after traveling through/to four different airports, having a suitcase that didn't make it back until today and I'm just ready for things to be quiet and stop moving.  The last two weeks have been a whirlwind of travel and my body/mind doesn't necessarily know what time it is.  This past week I was traveling for a death in the family and the week before that I was traveling for work.  I was very glad to get the opportunity to spend time with family but as always the time was entirely too short and we all made whirlwind trips for the funeral so we didn't get to spend lots of time together.  Mom and I even made an additional whirlwind day trip up further north to see my grandma; it added to the busyness of an already hectic trip but I was very glad that we got to spend some additional time with her (it was wonderful to see you grandma!).

While at the gravesite after the service, I talked to one of my uncles (on my Mom's side) about work. He's always worked an insane amount of hours (sometimes 12-14+ hours a day, 7 days a week) and it dawned on me that I'm guilty of doing the same.  When I talked with him about it, his response was, "don't be like me, even I don't want to be like me anymore, just don't do it."  He didn't really supply any insight of how I'm supposed to make this change but since it really surprised me coming from him, I do want to give it some serious thought.

One of the things my Mom and I talked about while we were visiting was how many people in my family (on both sides - immediate and extended) have addictive personalities of one form or another.  We have people with addictions to drugs, alcohol, food, work, etc. and it's damaging to all of us in it's different forms.  In my immediate family, in multiple people there are addictions to food and work and I am personally addicted to both of those things.  I know that I need to come up with a plan to overcome these addictions because they are both adding to my mental/physical/emotional stress and that's not healthy.  Knowing myself, I need to come up with some sort of a game plan before I can make a change because without said game plan, I will be more likely to just give up (because I am a perfectionist).

Something else Mom and I talked about is in our family we have a "BSA - with emphasis on the BS..."  The BSA stands for "B (last name which I'm not going to use here) Standard Answer" which we all tend to use to answer any question about ourselves - it's the "I'm fine" answer even when you're dying inside; or the "sure I can do that" when you already have 10,000 things on your plate; or even the answer of ignoring ourselves to put the needs/wants of others first.  This way of responding is something that I want to add to my "to do list" of things to change.  On one hand, I know it's good to want to help others but it's not always a good thing when you constantly put yourself last in order to make that happen.

On that note, my dear readers, this ringmaster is going to sign off for tonight in order to gear up for whatever comes my way when I head into work tomorrow.  I need to prepare myself by picking a very "me" outfit to put on so I have that armor for whatever I'm walking into.  I hope you have a great week and have opportunities to let the sawdust settle in your personal circus.  Thanks for joining me! =)

Zombie

I survived this past week, with the teen, mostly unscathed and we both made it to his competition and back.  On our first travel day, we ended up getting the rental car and just driving; we ended up in a questionable location, made a U-turn, and then went to a fabulous beach where the teen had the opportunity to dive into the ocean.  After that, we went to where we were staying and the competition time began.

It was nice to have the opportunity to hang out with other centers and get ideas from them on some of their programming (as well as offering some insight as what we do at my center).  One of the team building exercises we got to experience was an Escape Room.  The teens had the chance to work together to escape a Shakespeare themed room and the advisors had the chance to work together to escape a 40's style detective office (the hardest room they had to offer; which only had a 9% escape rate) - we didn't escape either room but we had a fun time.  Once we left Escape Room, we enjoyed yummy pizza at a small pizza place and just enjoyed some relaxation.

The next day, the interviews/speeches for the teens began.  The teen I went with, didn't want assistance with his speech beforehand but he did ask for my help the day of.  I heard it the first time, and I have to say, I was impressed.  He was articulate, passionate and he got his point across.  When it came time to give his speech in front of the judges/advisors/teens during lunch, he went "rogue" and said something that gave shock value to his speech.  I wasn't necessarily shocked by it because it was very him but other advisors asked me about it after the fact - I just shrugged and said, "he went rogue and stayed true to himself" and I left it at that.

So why am I a zombie you may ask?  While on this trip, I housed with another advisor and two teenage girls - the nights were too late and the mornings were too early so there was little time for sleep.  While I was gone, I received word from my parents that my grandfather passed away.  I've been dealing with that news/grief in my own way.  After giving it a lot of thought and talking it through with people, my day yesterday started very early with text messages to my boss, looking at the airline website, booking a hotel and a video call with my parents to make arrangements for me to be able to attend the funeral.  Even though I was gone from work all last week, I'm going to be leaving work again in order to attend; I'll be at work all day tomorrow and then Tuesday morning in order to accomplish all of the work I missed last week and to try and get done what I can for this upcoming week.  It's going to be another whirlwind week of travel, not enough sleep, high emotions but I'll be with family so that will at least help.

At times I have wondered what it would be like to be on the road all of the time for work and I don't know if I'm cut out for it.  I know that I'm definitely not cut out for it in my current situation where there is work that needs to be done before/during/after travel and be worried how it's going to get accomplished and if the mentality of the building is "while the cat's away, the mice will play..."  Maybe if it was my job to travel things would be different and I would have a different outlook.  At least packing should be somewhat easy since most of what was in my suitcase this past week will be going back in the suitcase for this upcoming week...

Well, my dear readers, this zombie should probably sign off of her for this evening so I can get a "to do" list together for work and to get ready for my upcoming trip this week.  I have my fingers crossed that I get everything accomplished that I need to at work but I'm going to look at it that I'm going to get accomplished what I get accomplished and leave it at that.  Even though I have a long couple of days ahead of me, I am definitely looking forward to seeing my family even if it's not under the best of circumstances.  I am hoping to get some rest tonight but we'll see if sleep eludes me tonight or not. Thank you for joining me my dear readers, hopefully none of you are zombies but if you are, you are welcome here - no zombie discrimination here!  =)

Gloriously Messy

I came across the phrase "Gloriously Messy" and it spoke to me.  The context in which "gloriously messy" was used, this particular individual was describing some things that had happened in their past and they were saying their life was "gloriously messy."  I can relate to that terminology and I'm going to embrace it.

There are definitely some aspects of my life that are messy and I don't know where to find enough bleach/sanitizer to clean those areas up.  Those of you who don't know me, I am not necessarily a "cleaner" and I am perfectly fine with the lived in look - if there is a horizontal surface of my apartment that doesn't have something on it, give me five minutes and there will be.  I know that not everyone can operate in that type of setting but I definitely can.  I'm one that has piles of everything but I know what's in those piles; and I'm okay with that.  That being said, I'm one that has trouble functioning when things are messy at work; it adds to my already astronomical stress level (which is something that I need to figure out how to get a handle on).

This past week at work, I had two staff members need to be out due to illness (one of them actually came into my office, closed the door, and basically demanded that they be sent home due to a sore throat - she had been fine the day before and was able to talk - hmmmm......) and I had to be in programming with them out.  I didn't get accomplished near what I wanted to last week and this upcoming week I'm going to be out of office four out of the five days so that will limit what I can get completed.  I have a "to do" list in my head and I am going to cross off as many things as I can tomorrow since that's all that I have.  Granted, I'll have time to work while I'm gone but I won't have access to my computer (I'll have email access) and I'll be attending classes and "mandatory fun" while I'm out of the office.

This week I'll be heading out of town with one of the teenagers from the building while they attend a competition.  Because I'm the manager, I'm the lucky one who gets to accompany him and he's not happy that I'm his chaperone.  He has expressed before that I dress crazy and am wild and I just look at those as compliments (even though I'm sure he didn't mean them that way).  I was looking through some photos on my phone earlier today and came across a saying that I may have to share with him this week (or just keep tucked in the back of my mind in case I need it later) -   "I am figuring out which parts of my personality are mine and which ones I created to please you" author unknown.

Unless I absolutely have to, I have been trying very hard to let my personality shine and let my freak flag fly without really caring what other people think.  Today, I wore a track jacket with every color done as brush strokes on it while I ran errands.  I ended up at one on my favorite clothing stores to pick one thing in particular up and one of the sales people commented on my "style."  She asked if she could recommend a top to me (I was impressed by her sales skills but I didn't feel any pressure to buy) to at least try on because she wanted to see it on me.  She ended up bringing me two tops that both definitely fit my style and I ended up buying both of them (hey, it helped that they were buy one, get one half off).  I'm looking forward to wearing my new found treasures.

Well my dear readers, I should probably bring this to a close for this evening to try to accomplish a couple more things before heading to bed.  I need to make sure I get some good sleep since I have a pretty hefty to do list tomorrow with leaving Tuesday morning for my work trip.  I hope you have opportunities this week to show your personalities and to let your freak flags fly!  =)

I'm Possible

Even though I keep saying that I'm going to find a way to cut back on my work hours, I worked approximately a 66 hour work week last week.  Since I worked such a long week, I decided to take myself to the movies after work on Friday night (even though I was tired and just wanted to put my feet up).  I took myself to the new Sally Field movie and I truly enjoyed it!  In one of the scenes that I found to be extremely profound, Sally Field character and her friend went to see a motivational speaker.  In true form, the motivational speaker had a few "catch phrases" but one of them really stuck with me.  He said, rather than looking at things/tasks as impossible, think about how to turn them into I'm possible instead.

Now I'm not usually and overly positive person and don't tend to look at the glass as being half full (I tend to just see a glass of water).  That doesn't mean that I don't see the possibilities in front of me; my problem is I often see too many possibilities in front of me and have difficulty picking which possibility to go with.  Knowing that I'm an overthinker/perfectionist can and does make things difficult at times but I guess there could be worse things than seeing too many possibilities - for me, it would be worse not to see any possibilities at all...

One of the possibilities I wouldn't have imagined for myself before it happened is, six years ago today I performed my very first belly dance solo.  A photo from that night popped up on my Facebook newsfeed today and I was stunned.  I am definitely not the same dancer that I was that night.  What started out as a hobby and something to get me out of my apartment after my divorce has given me an opportunity to express a side of my personality that I didn't even know needed expressing.  I am definitely glad that I have been able to enjoy the performance opportunities that I've had thus far and look forward to having more in the future.

I have been reminded multiple times this week of something my Mom told me not that long ago (I'm hoping one of these days it'll stick...); "you are not qualified to run the universe so stop trying!"  While I don't necessarily feel as if I'm trying to run the universe, I know that I definitely have too much on my plate that I am trying to accomplish.  Maybe I need to get one of those compartment plates that they make for kids or a cafeteria tray so I can sort through some of the things on my plate vs. just continually allowing more things to be piled on.   I need to get out of the lunch line or away from the buffet so more things don't continue to overwhelm my plate.

Something that will be helpful going into this upcoming week is the fact that the kids at work will be returning to school so they won't be in the building from 7 am - 6 pm as they have been for the past two weeks.  I also get to sleep in the mornings vs. when I've had to get up in order to get to work and open the building before the kids arrived.  Since the building will be quiet in the mornings (and one of my staff members will be back from maternity leave starting tomorrow), I'm hoping that I'll be able to get quite a bit of work accomplished; especially since the week after next, I'll be out of the building at a training.

I know I've said it before but I am hoping that the time away from the building will help my staff not depend on me so much and I can actually take a vacation or even just random time off of work.  I know that I have done this in the past but the time away seems to be fewer and far between.  In order to achieve time off for me, I know that I have to empower the staff to accomplish what needs to be done while I'm gone and trust that it actually will get accomplished.  I guess only giving that opportunity to them will show me (and them) if this is a possibility.

On that note, I am going to bring this to a close for tonight so I can get myself in the frame of mind of going into work tomorrow after my 66 hour work week last week (including working 6 hours on Saturday for an event).  I wish you many possibilities in the week ahead and I thank you for joining me again.  =)