On drifting, insomnia and cake

It is easy to drift away, especially when you feel tired. When you are under-slept, or stressed, or when you have too many things demanding your attention. In times like these it is hard to focus, to stay away from that cake (notice I didn't even bother with the word slice), to still your mind and to even understand what it is that you need.

I once came across this Zen proverb that says that you should sit in meditation for twenty minutes every day - unless you're too busy; then you should sit for an hour. And this feels wrong and counter-intuitive, but such is the nature of life. Or rather, the society we created makes this look counter-intuitive because it goes against the rat race mentality. This rush, rush, rush to get everything done, to have more, to be more, to showcase an unblemished life where we are always strong and level-headed.

I suffer from bouts of insomnia. I will sleep like a baby for weeks, and then have a really terrible night, which can turn into a poorly slept week, until my body finally tires itself out and finds balance once again.

I am going through one such bout right now. So all I want to be left alone to read my book with a dragon portion of cookies. In my current state I don't really care about being sensible, and that's okay. I don't want to meditate, I can't focus for more than thirty seconds at a time and screw body scanning!

All my life I wanted to be strong and faultless. Which is to say I did not want to be perceived as ignorant and weak. But if the last few years have taught me anything is that it is pointless to fight having flaws. You will falter and you will lose your way at times; that's normal and to be expected. No one can be strong all the time; everything in nature goes through peaks and troughs, so it would be unnatural to expect humanity to be anything different than the wonderful (albeit infuriating) roller coaster we are. So wish not for the strength to withstand all storms, but rather wish for the wisdom and awareness to understand there is a storm.

At the end of the day all I really need is to accept I am not at my best and self-nurture. It would be pointless to force myself to meditate, but on days like today I am aware meditation-like stuff is medicinal and could save me a world of trouble. So I lovingly take care of myself as I would a sick loved one. I am patient because my mind can only do so much. I celebrate everything I do right, because everything is a small conquest. I do less, so much less. Less talking, less interacting with others, less distractions, less food (because in my state it would certainly be the wrong kind of food), less overthinking, less commitments.

...

I re-read the first few sentences of this point and this is not where I wanted to take this post. Which perfectly illustrates my point. I understand my mind is a bit of jumble of things today. I accept, understand and love the mess. I will make sure the world is safe from it. And I will sit tightly to avoid that cake.

The quest for zen

For a few years now I have dabbed in meditation. This was on the back of several studies I came across, all proving that a short but regular meditation practice helps you to rewire your brain and develop the amount of grey matter you have. It has proven to be particularly helpful for victims of childhood trauma who suffer from excessive neural pruning. At this point I must say that I am not minimally qualified to discuss the medical benefits of meditation, so if you want to find out more, I would highly advise you to look it up.

Anyway, about three years ago I downloaded the Headspace app, and off I went. The Headspace app offers a series of different packs on a variety of subjects to help you bring mindfulness into all areas of your life. I did the foundation pack and then started on packs on happiness, acceptance, and others. At first I struggled to concentrate; all these new concepts were a complete novelty. With time I found it got considerably easier to focus on my breath or the sounds around me, or even how my body felt. It was peaceful and I left feeling replenished. I felt settled, like a pond that finally quietens after a pebble was thrown in and the ripples have finally stopped growing.

Which brings me to now. Now I feel like an impostor. Eight times out of ten I spend most of my meditation session thinking about work or my grocery list. It's like my mind doesn't take it seriously anymore and just bypasses it completely. I know why it's important. I know how much better I'll feel once I open my eyes again. I just find it hard to stay focused. And the more I am aware of this, the more I struggle.

So I found ways around it. I pick a song, put my headphones in, and keep my eyes and my mind clear from start to finish. I focus on the song, on the words and the melody.

I sit cross legged in front of the mirror and I look at my body. The eyes that allow me to see the world. The feet and legs that allow my to move. The arms that carry so much, the hands that intertwine with another set of hands, that type and hold a fork from plate to mouth. The nose where I see my mother's family.

I pick an object in my life and give thanks to the thousands of people between me and that item. Think I am exaggerating? Let's make the exercise with a mug of coffee then! Someone had to grow and care for the coffee plant. Someone had to harvest it and ground the beans. Someone had to package it and sell it. People had to design and produce the package it comes in. It had to be imported, then stored in a warehouse, driven to a supermarket, put on the system and later on a shelf. Now do the same with the mug. And the kettle where you boil the water to make it. Before you notice it, your life as you know it relies on millions and millions of other people. And all this time you were thinking backwards on the human effort behind a simple mug of coffee you haven't been obsessing over your life. Job done!

I am sure I could carry on, but you get the gist.

I still want to incorporate meditation in the traditional sense into my life. And forgive myself for not being perfect at it. For having days (months!) when I downright suck at it. After all there is a reason why they call it a practice.

Back again

So here I am again, almost a year since my last post.

I know I have always been a fickle blogger, and quite frankly I am okay with that. This is a space I created mostly for me. If anyone chooses to read these posts (if they happen to like them), then great! If not, then I'm comfortable with what I have.

This year I decided to be more focused and organised. Enter bullet journaling! If you don't know what it is, then go out and read all about it; it's awesome! Imagine having a notebook to keep your whole life organised. It's a diary, a journal, a planner, a list space, a drawing notebook, all rolled into one. Plus you get to personalise it as much as you want and make it pretty!

I had high hopes for this because it meant I could just write anytime, anywhere. Here is where I went wrong: as romantic as it is, I don't actually like my handwriting, and I find my handwriting speed infuriatingly slow. I much rather go through the bother of turning my laptop and only writing a few times a week (and I'm being grossly optimistic here!), than facing an empty page, only to see it (ever so) slowly being filled with an untidy handwritten text.

So that leads me to here and now.

I am hopelessly in love with bullet journaling, I just won't be using it for texts where I would - plain and simple - rather type.

So here's to what is left of 2018. Let's make it awesome!

 

Rock stars of the now

All my life I have been in a love affair with tomorrow. Tomorrow was the magical day when my life would start falling into place. Tomorrow I would start my diet without a single stumble. Tomorrow I would go to the gym and run 10k in one go. Tomorrow I would write that entire essay with great flair and panache. Tomorrow I would tidy up my room. Always tomorrow.

I lived in awe of future me. Future me was awesome. She was the right weight, she got stuff done, she had the right skills, she had conquered her fears and tamed her shortcomings. She was wise, and confident, and funny and people loved her. Future me was a rock star.

What I never realised throughout my formative years, was that all that did was make present me feel even more demoralised. Because future me was everything present me was not. So present me might as well slump in the sofa watching a film while eating cake.

But here is the kicker: present me is so much more of a rock star that future me could ever be. Why? Because future me will always a bit of a poser. She lives on whatever present me achieves. Here is an example from my own experience:

I was never an early riser, but about two years ago I realised that if I wanted to make a true commitment to exercising my body I had to get up early and do it before the rest of my life got in the way. And so I did; I set my alarm clock to stupid a.m. (official time), and when the alarm went off I simply made myself get up. No snooze, no I-wish-I-could-stay-here-for-all-eternity, just motion. To be perfectly honest, most of the energy came from a place of anger at past me, who had set the alarm to stupid a.m., so I figured I might as well do something with it. But I digress.

The first few weeks were brutal. I did not want to do it; I was sleepy, grumpy and it was far too cold outside my bed. But with every day that passed things started to get easier. I was forming a habit. And the thing with habits is that after a while they start sustaining themselves. The neuro pathways for that particular task are strengthened with repetition and it all becomes easier and easier.

So when people tell me today how impressed they are about my morning habit, I feel like it is only a half-deserved compliment. Because I'm not actually doing much. Mostly I am just riding the wave of habit. The gruelling work was done by past (once present) me. So what I enjoy today are the fruits of that hard labour.

And this is truly eye-opening. Future me will always be a bit of an impostor. Present me is the true hero. Because only she can take action. Only she can shape what is to come. And she is too busy rocking her life to slump around eating cake anymore. She has a world of wondrous paths to pave.

The day perfection died

All my life I wanted to be the perfect blank. The perfect daughter, the perfect friend, the perfect student (this one is slightly debatable, I think it's fairer to say I simply wanted to have the best grades out of everyone). I wanted to be better than my peers at everything. Better at helping around the house. Better at cross stitching. Faster to learn how to ride a bike. Quieter when in close proximity to an adult (because adults loooove a child who knows how to be quiet). And every time I fell short it felt like a sharp sting. I wasn't as good as all those other kids (never mind they weren't perfect either!). I was disappointed in myself and I had let everyone down.

And here is the kicker: it wouldn't make one bit of difference how much I tried, I would ALWAYS fall short of perfect simply because perfect does not exist. And I have forced myself to live a life where all I do is chase a multitude of unattainable carrots at the end of a stick.

Even as an grown adult I still strive for perfect. And even if those rare moments when I did get there, I wouldn't trust that I did. That presentation was perfect, but how can I make it better next time? Dinner was spot on, but how can we make it tastier/faster to cook/cheaper/more exciting? It seems that in my search for perfect nothing, not even perfect would do.

So I ask: why did I keep doing it to myself over and over and over?

In light of this I am taking drastic measures. For the first time in my life I am erasing that word from my vocabulary. Perfect is deceased. It is no more. Not on my lips, and hopefully not in my thoughts either.

I am boycotting perfect.

From now on it's present over perfect for me (which incidentally in the name of the book I'm currently reading, and that helped solidify this new resolve, you can buy it here).

From now on I choose to be. As I am, flaws and all. Right here, right now. And I shall grow organically from this point with no (perfect) goal in sight. And I will be happy and content. And I will be there, wherever there is. I will be present. And isn't that better than perfect?

The life-saving art of being enough

I remember going to see Babe in cinemas. I was eight years old and it was my first grown up film (and by grown up I mean live action, not dubbed, in English and with subtitles). It felt like a rite of passage and a test to my budding reading skills.

The thing that stuck with me more than anything was the final shot of the farmer looking down at Babe and uttering the magical words "That'll do, pig. That'll do.". I remember how good those words felt. Like a gulp of water when you've been parched for so long. 

They sounded of utter acceptance. Of being enough. And in this day and age we have been raised to believe and feel we are never enough. We have been taught to strive for perfect, even though we know that doesn't exist. We live our lives chasing and impossible dream. A carrot on the end of a stick that we will never - ever! - reach.

Think about it; our society is built around making us feel flawed, insecure, unworthy and miserable. Through billboards and media everywhere there is the eternal message that you will not be happy until you own the new model of whatever car or phone, until you look like an impossible picture from a magazine (not even models look like that, which must do wonders for their self-esteem and self-worth!, but I digress), until you watch the must-see film of the year, until, until, until.

And it seems we are leading our lives waiting for that perfect tomorrow that will never arrive. This fact coupled with the constant feeling of failure because who we are and what we do is never enough poisons our days and undermines our self-worth.

So if perfect does not exist, why are we still using that word? Why can't we just accept that we are enough right here and right now? We have enough skills, enough willpower, enough talents, enough blessings to be happy right now.

Over the years that one line has become one of my biggest mantras. "That'll do, pig. That'll do." Because I am enough. Yes, I can and I choose to improve my life. I want to explore and to push way past my comfort zone. There are so many new and exciting adventures awaiting me out there. But all of this comes from a place of knowing I am already enough.

Because perfectionism is a joy killer and enough is where happiness lives. When you accept that something or someone is enough you stop trying to improve it and you start to enjoy it. To live mindfully in the moment. You accept the little flaws in order to enjoy the good.

The living room may not be perfectly tidy, but it is tidy enough, so you grab your book and your mug of tea and enjoy an afternoon reading in the sofa. Your child may take longer to complete a certain task, or do it in a less effective way, but instead of getting frustrated you tell yourself that the fact the task got done in the end is enough, at least for now. The sky may not be perfectly cloudless, but it's sunny and bright enough to enjoy a walk in the park you might not have done if you had otherwise stayed in waiting for perfect weather. A conversation with a someone you care about may not have been perfect and they might even have stepped on your toes a bit, but you see the meaning and intentions behind the words and suddenly you get it and that is enough.

I've come to the realisation that enough is all you need and I live my life on a quest against perfection. Because at the end of the day "That'll do, pig. That'll do" will do it every time.

Living in the now

Earlier this week we went to the Zoo. I haven't been in years, and it is something we never did together, so it was a great experience. At some point we saw otters. Now let me pause for a moment here. I love otters. Otters are my patronus. They are my spirit animal. They are my reincarnation goal. So naturally, as my boyfriend started taking pictures of them, he looked at me and, with great surprise on his face, asked me why I wasn't taking any pictures. 

And my answer to that question is this: because whenever possible I choose to be in the moment with my own eyes, instead of filtering and limiting my experience through some form of lens.

Yes, there are many moments when I absolutely love taking pictures for posterity, especially the goofy kind. But think about this for a moment: your eye can surpass any lens there is (by a lot!), so unless you really want to take that picture, why would you? Not to mention that when you look at your camera you are shutting off from literally everything else around you. And you worry about your shot, the light, the framing, the zoom, that person what is not moving away fast enough for you to take a picture without them in it. And all of this is keeping you from actually experiencing and savouring the moment you are in. 

Another little nugget: how often do you go back on your pictures anyway? If you spend an entire concert looking at it through your phone (because you are recording it), are you really experiencing it? And at what cost? Do you really do anything with the video after more than two days have passed? Because I had this particular experience and let me tell you that I never - ever! - watched the videos I made of that concert (to a point that I don't remember where they are or - most shockingly of all - what concert it was, because I wasn't truly living it).

I am not a world renowned photographer and I don't think I could take a picture of an otter that would be worth printing and hanging on my living room wall. There are professionals that do a great job at this, so I don't bother much myself. Instead I chose to drink in the moment for all its worth. I looked at the otters, from the pups to the adults and back to the pups again, from their tiny paws to their adorable expressions. I heard the cute little noises they made. I noticed the shadows of overhead trees on their fur. I felt the odd breeze that made the hairs on my arms stand on end, and how the muscles in my legs seemed to enjoy not walking for that little break. And I watched the otters so so closely.  

Please don't get me wrong, I still take A LOT of pictures, I really, really do. And not just the goofy kind, sometimes I go properly artistic. But I ponder on the cost involved in taking every single one of them. Because life goes by so fast that if you don't pay attention, you might miss it altogether. Slow is the new happy. And remembering to be in the moment may just save your life.

And just as I kept revisiting the otter moment in the Zoo, I came across this little piece of Leon Logothetis' book, The Kindness Diaries (highly recommended, the documentary is also available on Netflix worldwide):  

As I drove out of Utah and into Colorado, I looked up to find a double rainbow stretching across the towering Rocky Mountain skyline. Maybe because I slightly feared what was ahead, all I could do was appreciate the present moment. I had no iPhone to distract me. No Internet to take away my Zen. In that moment, surrounded by nature's extreme beauty, I realized that in this time of endless calls and texts and Insta-everything, we think we are connected. But it's a false connectivity. What we often lose is that relationship with the deeper fiber of life. As I drove through the crisp Rockies, the summer morning expanding before me, I knew that this was the real network. This was connection.

Leon Logothetis

Hello silence, my old friend

We live in a world where distraction comes so easily. We spend our days immersed in books, films, series, articles, TED videos, podcasts. So it's easy to lose ourselves. To stop noticing how we are. How we feel. What we're thinking. What we want. Where we are going. Without realising it we are living one day after another immersed a multitude of realities (fictional and otherwise) and we forget to remind ourselves of the big picture. Am I doing something today to ensure I achieve that long, far-away goal I said I'd meet in *insert achievable timescale*? Am I moving forward or am I standing still?

For the last couple of years I've been on a mission to rewire my life, inside and out. I have watched countless TED videos, listened to multiple podcasts and read numerous authors on a plethora of topics, from lifehacks for your kitchen to productivity, to dealing with past trauma, to being a better partner, to pretty much anything remotely related to personal development.

I listen to podcasts on my walk to work, I read books on the bus, I work, I leave work and repeat the same process and then on my free time what do I do? I read fiction and watch films and series. And this left me wondering: where am I in the middle of all this? Where is my voice?

In a world that has grown so loud I have forgotten the importance of silence. Of standing still. Of being in the moment. Of not worrying about all I still have to do, or fretting over what I am doing. Of being enough. 

All those articles have been paramount to all the changes I have made in my life and for that I am grateful. But when I open my mouth I want to be sure the words that come out are truly my own. Things I matured myself and not half empty words from someone marooned and lost within my head. So I am making an effort to take a step back from the deluge of information I subject myself to daily.

Yes, I will still read those articles, but I will not binge. I will not spend hours alienated from the world (no matter how engrossing the book!). And I will not torture myself if don't achieve absolutely everything on my daily to-do list simply because I decided to spend some time looking at steam rising from a cup of tea or listening to a good song. Because those things bring me back to the present. I will check up with myself more. I will write more. I will speak more. I will feel more. I will live more.

Do you want to join me?

Thankful Thursday # 28

Here we are again. Of all the changes in my life in the past few years, this weekly thankfulness practice is one of the things that stuck. And here's some of the reasons why:

1. My boyfriend. I love this man to bits and I am so happy and proud to share my life with him.
2. My kindle As a home owner I've come to the painful realisation that books take a lot of space and gather a heck of a lot of dust. So the kindle allows me to buy every book I want without the added space.
3. The cooler weather. I loved the sunny days, but I have missed sleeping comfortably under a duvet.
4. Disposable income. I wouldn't say I splash money, but every now and then I like to buy something without the worry of whether it will impact my finances.
5. The big sleuth. Birmingham is full of bear statues, and I've started collecting selfies with them. Twenty down, one hundred and seventeen to go!
6. Being able to make a conscious choice to be better, every day.
7. Otters. Cute and fluffly and totally able to put a smile on my face.

The life-saving art of gratitude

Today, I woke up to the sound of much rain and wind. It was stupid am (that's the official time), and I had set my alarm clock to go to the gym before work. I pondered not going. The weather was terrible; very wet, very windy, cloudy and cold.

And as I sat on the sofa, drinking my morning coffee in my pajamas and debating whether to get dressed in gym clothes or work clothes, I felt this wave of gratitude wash over me. I have been practising gratitude for a few years now and it has truly transformed my life and how my senses take on the Universe around me. Gratitude has reshaped my mind and has given me a new trust in the world and all the good and kindness within it. Because as I was mulling over to workout or not to workout, my gratitude muscles kicked in and this is what I knew:

I was grateful for the warm, comfy bed where I had rested, and which would be waiting for me at the end of the day.

I was grateful that I had a gym to workout in, instead of having to run outside in the rain.

I was grateful for the warm shower I would have in the gym before work.

I was grateful for being dry again after bracing the weather.

I was grateful for the raindrops that would fall on my bare legs and would wake me up to the new day.

I was grateful for the not so glamorous weather that allowed me to concentrate on my book instead of gazing out the bus window.

I was grateful for the almost empty gym.

I was grateful for many, many things. All still from the comfort of my sofa. Because I have learned to believe that there are many things to be grateful for, even if I haven't experienced them yet. I could close my eyes and feel all the items listed above and how good they would feel. I left the house with a smile on my face as I made my way to the gym.

Because happiness waits for no man (or woman). And I certainly am not going to pen myself waiting for the rain to pass. So I learn to brace the weather and find joy where I can. And turns out that's pretty much anywhere.