All posts tagged: sense of self

Virgo

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I sound slightly controlling and suspicious.  I blame it on the Virgo in me.  I am not a ‘perfectionist’ Virgo.  If I were a perfectionist I’d have better handwriting and probably not walk around town with my fly down like I did over the weekend or with my pants on backwards like I did the month before. I am a ‘particular’ Virgo. I am a Virgo who is  appreciative of order understood in her way, according to her own rules. I am particular with things making sense to me in a specific manner fitting nicely together in a puzzle that I can understand. This doesn’t mean to say I am not spontaneous and often impulsive. Spontaneous with predicted (hopeful) outcomes and impulses that maintain my boundaries are the best kind. So embarrassed but if I can’t admit my quirks to you here and now, dear readers, then when will I? Photo Source: Zelma Rose Zodiac Constellation Necklaces

The Fugly Stick

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I woke up the other day and saw that I was hit hard by the Fugly (feeling ugly) Stick.  I don’t mean “effing ugly,” the super harsh meaning of fugly in pop culture, but “feeling ugly” with the emphasis on raw emotions, coated in nerves, wrapped tightly in mental cobwebs & sealed with shadows under the eyes, a back ache  or greasy hair.

Life Changing

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I bought a 2″ barrel curling iron but it did not change my life.  I was really hoping it would. It prompted me to finally sign up for Dirty Pop, wanting to add more cardio to my workout and believing sexy hair is required to make the moves work, more than knowing how to dance.  “One hour of choreographed hip hop moves poured out by a Pussy Cat Doll- like instructor” is how I would describe it.  Forget the  isolated hip thrusts and slithering around, I was fixated on how the teacher and two of the students were working their hair as much as they were gyrating their boo-tays.  As important as coordination, what makes the dancing divine is the full hair tossing, mussing and flipping.  How does their hair know not to stick to their foreheads?  Why does their hair, when pushed opposite to their natural parts,  seem sensual not scraggly?  Am I the only one reaching for my elastic? For at least two months, my eye has been caught by many a beautiful head …

That Girl

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I am that girl who asks the questions she really can’t handle the answers to. I am that girl who misplaces her neck cream and finds it days later under her bed. I am that girl who plays imaginary Go Fish with invisible cards at a table of two year olds. I am that girl who gets nostalgic each time she makes a smoothie in the blender she received as a wedding gift. I am that girl who lives for heels but lives in flats. I am that girl who hoards paper and stationery. I am that girl who used to paint and draw. I am that girl who buys fresh ginger week after week just to find them all shriveled on the kitchen countertop month after month. I am that girl who has half used tubes of lotion and random lipgloss in each and every bag. I am that girl who can pull splinters out of tiny hands with her finger tips, pick tan bark out of a preschooler’s nostril, and clear pebbles out …

The Eyes Have Had It

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“Stop making that face.” Don’t squint. Stop rolling your eyes. Always sleep on your back. Never rub your eyes even when they are itchy. Remove all makeup before bed.  No exceptions. Use non medicated eyedrops for dry eyes. Use under eye cream. Use under eye gel. Use sunscreen under your eyes. Don’t touch the area around your eyes. Massage around your eyes. Make sure you are gentle with your eyes. Growing up my mother had warned me about my expressiveness potentially being hazardous for my looks.  I don’t do “poker face” very well.  My whole face moves while I talk, my lips curl when I am self conscious, my brows move up and down while I listen and I look every which way as I think.  I am now about the age my mom must have been when she started telling me to stop doing all of that, and frankly, I get it.  She was right.  No, it’s not because I have a daughter whose reactions drive me crazy, whose eye rolls push my buttons. …

Nobody Said It Was Going To Be Easy

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Sometimes I wish I were that girl who didn’t make the right choices.  It is so much easier to be the one who does what she wants and doesn’t think about consequences or other people.  Life appears smoother to the one who never needs to wonder about long term consequences, never feeling the responsibility to positively affect change in the world, or wish to be more in touch with her higher being.  I wish being my higher being or best self didn’t involve having to make hard ass choices.I wish it were easier for me to turn a blind eye … to say to hell with it. I am thankful though, that I do think bigger than myself. Nobody said it was going to be easy.  So I need to stop being surprised when it isn’t. Making hard ass choices cause us to question our values.  They challenge our conviction.  They make our shoulders feel lighter, but make our chests close up, and make it hard to breathe.  Making hard choices that are good for …

I Know What It Is Like to Cry

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I know what it is like to cry.  I know what it is like to have a good ugly Claire Danes style snotfest watching The Notebook on a mid afternoon flight.  I know what it is like to cry quiet disappointed tears, curled in the fetal position with my head in my husband’s lap.  I know what it is like to cry tears of joy greeting my mom at the airport.   I know what it is like to cry from laughing so hard with a girlfriend that we forget to breathe.  I know what it is like to cry after saying good bye to a loved one for the last time. I know what it is like to cry sympathetic tears for someone unable to cry on his own.   I am quite the crier.  I think it comes with the territory when you love big, you just feel many emotions in a very big way too. And now, after Friday night, I know what it is like to cry from being overwhelmingly thankful. I …

If I Dressed the Way I Pinned…

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If I 100% dressed the way I pinned, my life would be so different. For the most part, wearing the clothes I pin would not work on the bus, and since I don’t drive I would then be forced to walk much more, but the heels I’d be teetering on, wedges or not, wouldn’t get me too far. If I dressed the way I pinned, that would likely mean I would need to start getting ready 60 minutes earlier than I already do, or planning my outfits the night before while my hair is set in a mask and my pores are shrinking back to recover from just being stripped. Dressing the same way I pin would mean not only that I would actually be rotating all of the shoulder bags, totes, and clutches in my closet regularly, but that I would actually be able to find them exactly when I need them. Dressing the same way I pin might even mean that some days, the pockets to my jeans would be enough to carry me …

The Prodigal Pal

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So here’s the thing… Monday on my day off, I had a list of things I wanted and needed to do: 1.  Look into tickets to go visit my mom. 2.  Start planning a fun getaway for my husband’s 40th birthday. 3.  Buy a better pot for our newest indoor tree, Lucas (I hope Bertie likes him). 4.  Plan a menu for the week. 5.  Determine whether or not to attend ALT Summit, SLC. Instead, I ended up chatting with an old friend who you could consider part of the long-lost variety.   Even though we are “friends” on Facebook, we hadn’t spoken in years. It isn’t because we became enemies, we just stopped being friends.  There was not a huge fight that ended the relationship, though there may have been a tense encounter or two at the finish line to ensure the completion of it.  This friend had less time for me and wasn’t afraid to show it, saying, “Nah,” with no alternative suggestions to any of our typical plan making for the weekends became the …

Taking the time to not be so crazy

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Something occurred to me.  I decided to cut back at work, from full time to heavy part time two years ago, and now from heavy to light part time starting this week.  I can’t explain to you what is meant by heavy part time, if only to say, imagine being in the same place you meant to leave in order to get some head space and to make room for big changes in your life, only to still be there, two years later, not doing your old job at 40 hours, but doing bits and pieces of six other ones instead, with the same emotional and mental intensity that burns out your adrenals 30 hours a week.  Imagine self inflicting guilt on yourself to stay.  Imagine a trusted ivy league educated therapist who has worked with you once a week for three years reflecting back to you your own words describing an unconscious desire to move on from this job… but still staying.  Yeah…. crazy. So this week I am giving myself a break and …