All posts filed under: Sense of Self

Be Audacious

Published by

Welcome to my 555 series! Please read the introduction to this project {here}.  Week 5 Post 5 I think we all get so used to letting go of dreams that don’t work out, that we are at a loss for handling ourselves years later when we start dreaming about them again. We doubt if it is ever going to materialize, and we doubt whether we even deserve it because, “shouldn’t it have happened to me by now if I was worthy to begin with?”   We are haunted by thoughts & moments that we pushed to the side at one sad point either due to failure or by unfortunate necessity. These unrelenting ghosts fill us with hope & the audacity to think we can still achieve these greater things.   Let’s be audacious then, shall we?    

Mixed 

Published by

Welcome to my 555 series! Please read the introduction to this project {here}.  Week 4 Post 5 I was high-strung for a full day after my therapist told me, “you’re not a laid back person, and it’s OKAY!!!”  I break into hysterical laughter over my friends’ most inane inside jokes but roll my eyes at jokes told by inane people. I miss my family so much but get anxious whenever I have to plan a trip home.  I like spending most of my time alone, but am always thinking of who I’d like to hang out with next. I’m a member of the Mixed Emotions Club.    

Standards Not Expectations 

Published by

Welcome to my 555 series! Please read the introduction to this project {here}.  Week 4 Post 2 “Have standards not expectations.  Standards are something you have for yourself, and expectations are something you have for someone else. And you control yourself you don’t control other people. If you say that you don’t accept a certain kind of behavior or treatment, people who fit that standard and treat you that way fit into your life, and people who don’t are out. Whereas if you’re like ‘I expect you to do this, that, and the other,’ that’s not something you have control over, so you’re setting yourself up to be unhappy.”  ~Daphne Oz    

Being a Damsel is Distressing

Published by

Wk 1 Post 5 Like those whiny damsels in disaster, for whom lines like: “Let’s leave her behind, man, she’s slowing us down,” were written, I blurted out, “I can’t!” “Always say ‘I Can’ even if you can’t,” the most rigid of my instructors replied to me while I flailed on the mat. “Teachers don’t let their students think they can’t,” she said with conviction. “Even if it doesn’t look right & it feels like you can’t do it,” she went on, while circling the room, “why not just tell yourself that you already can & keep working on it?”   Jolted by her words about yoga (& life), I thought, “True- I’m too old for this damsel in distress sh*t anyway.”  Welcome to my 5, 5, 5 series. The objective of this exercise is to write five lines five times a week for five weeks about anything. Habits don’t create themselves, after all. The frequency & length remains from post to post, but the topics will be varied. Read my introduction here.

Before 5 a.m.

Published by

Welcome to my 5, 5, 5 series. The objective of this exercise is to write five lines five times a week for five weeks about anything. Habits don’t create themselves, after all. The frequency & length remains from post to post, but the topics will be varied. Read my introduction here. Wk 1 Post 3 Sometimes I wish my whole life could happen under the covers before 5 a.m., without worry or concern for what might shake me within the other 17 hours of the day. That moment when I start to stir before I am supposed to be up, with my eyes just fluttering open in complete darkness. That moment before all the practicality of the day ahead squeezes the romance out of the dawn. This is the moment I wish I could stay in. Is it life or is it us that does the squeezing?

Lately … 09.15.2015

Published by

Lately I’ve been having lots of random thoughts that are good fodder for posts. In turn I have ended up only building my drafts folder with single lined entries, but can my excuse this time be that it’s been my birthday week – come on, the best ones are always celebrated over several days – so there’s no chance I could’ve sat down long enough to develop anything substantial?  Your ongoing forbearance, dear reader, can be your gift to me. Lately … I have been thinking: On getting anything done: I’m not overwhelmed, I’m just underfocused. On drawing, fiddling with a piano tune, etc etc: I’m not as bad as I thought, just not as wonderful as I’d wished. On kids: I’m having a love-hate relationship with kids lately. I adore them, from a distance. Someone told me it may be a coping mechanism… Either that or I’m just a b*+€h. On making green smoothies: By now you’d think I’ve got these down to a science. Makes sense because lately they taste like a laboratory experiment. On …

The Space Between A and Z

Published by

Today I woke up eager to doodle.  It is a nice feeling to have that urgency for activity back again.  Since the weekend hit, I’ve been excited about jumping out of bed and getting my hands busy in preparation for a new project. I am even blogging again, starting with an ongoing short Summer Stories series to catch you all up on what’s been up with me (gasp!!!).  Might I even start writing Snippets weekly again?  Oh my goodness, we shall see!!! I have lately been playing with doodles in a sketchbook, something I used to do in childhood, and focused on years later the summer of ’01 in an art program in Marin.  I never shared my figure drawings nor student portraiture outside of class thinking they were so mediocre compared to real art from legitimate artists. I made the amateur mistake of comparing my summer-old beginning to another’s decades-long career middle.   I don’t want to make that mistake anymore. It’s not like I aspired to be a professional artist, and see now that instead of dropping it altogether, I could have kept drawing as my instructor …

Summer Stories 2

Published by

Click to read Summer Stories 1 here. I am great at packing as long as I can bring everything with me. If that means checking two bags instead of one, or jamming an extra pair of shoes and another sweater into my personal item so my carry on isn’t too heavy, I will be fine. In the case of my summer story, I did all of that, plus sent a heavy box via media mail days before lift off. Though I had a couple of days to prepare before heading away for the summer,  I didn’t pack my suitcases until the final few hours before leaving.  A girl can learn a lot about herself when she is prepping to be away from her day to day life. In my mind, I needed very little.  All I cared about were the essentials. Absolute essentials. When faced with having to decide on what things are most important to us, we hear things like “photographs, my mother’s this, my father’s that.” Since I wasn’t just going on a trip, but taking an indefinite amount of time …

Summer Stories  1

Published by

At the end of last year I felt a pebble in my shoe, but thought nothing of it. The new year started off like any other, welcoming 2015 with little fan fare. No big trips planned, no milestones up the road, and nothing of immediate note in the horizon that might add strain or stress. That being said, I rolled through the first month just fine, but starting in February, I felt an emotional sensation similar to being repeatedly poked. I’d oddly twitch while standing still and feel digs in my side while in motion. That tiny pebble was still in my shoe, annoying me with each step, so to speak. Not at all physical, they were those nagging gut feelings you have, those whispers in the back of your mind that become very loud the moment you try to get very quiet. “Go away!”  I’d say to these irritants, “It’s all in my head,” I told myself point blank, “This is nothing.”  There is something I call the negative side of optimism, when a normally positive person like me shakes things off …

A Letter to My Future Self

Published by

To:  Me, June 30, 2016 From:  Me  June 30, 2015 This is not a letter to tell you what goals I have for the year ahead.  This isn’t a letter to tell you how much hope I am putting into you.  This letter is to tell you that the woman I am today already knows the time is now.  The time is not tomorrow.  The time wasn’t yesterday. I want to tell you, my 2016 self, that I have devoured countless books, listened to hours of podcasts, watched miles of video footage, and had many a heartfelt conversation that have covered twists and turns of my psyche and heart only to tell me in the end that the future doesn’t hold anything that today does not.  The future gleams bright for no woman who doesn’t take polish to silver every day. Without daily steps in 2015 to cultivate and care for a life well lived, 2016 will be nothing but a sad version of something that was once beautiful. One of my best friends since early adolescence is now very ill.  Please tell …