It's All About the Story
So I'm feeling the need to post something profound, but a long day of phone-calling, going to the DMV, trying to go to the Social Security office, and other miscellaneous tasks have left me feeling a bit... blank. Not bummed, or tired, but not very inspired either. A bit zombie-ish. That's what a lot of the past week has been like, an I can't even honestly tell you where that week has gone. I just know I've been doing stuff. And I hate that feeling. Not knowing where my time has gone, feeling like I've been uber-busy, and yet only being able to produce one or two items in evidence of any productivity. Kinda makes a girl feel a bit moored and deflated.
And yet, it's just one day, or one week, in the timeline of my life. Tomorrow is a new day with a new story to write. But if I'm not careful, when I get up tomorrow, I'll remeber today's story, and be mentally in it as if it were still the present. See, we are constantly telling ourselves stories about ourselves. Sometimes they're true, sometimes they're not, and sometimes they're a good mix of both. But the point is, whenever we are subconsciously telling ourself a story, it is a story that we believe. And we act like it's true in the present moment, whether it is or not. The thing is, we can change the story whenever we want. Yes, all day today I felt blocked and unproductive. But if I tell myself that tomorrow, guess what? I'll be blocked and unproductive. If I tell myself that even now, as I'm writing this - I'll be blocked and uproductive. But if I tell myself, hey, that's not who I am - yes, that's how I was earlier today, but that's not who I am, then I give myself the option to be a different - but equally authentic (if not moreso) - version of myself. I've also been very efficient and productive before, and that's another story about myself that I have done and can do again.
It's the same with being a woman. There have been moments when I have felt "fully female" - but if I keep telling myself the story about the Joneen who is insecure, who feels intimitated by the prom queens, who feels like she should stick to the more tomboy side of life because she's better at it, then that's the Joneen I'll end up being. But that story is not who I am. It is who I have been at times. But I have also at times been a girl who felt graceful, womanly, accomplished, and even - once or twice - beautiful. If I tell myself the story about me when I felt like that, and tell myself it often enough, I will eventually be like that.
And while we shouldn't always listen to the stories others tell about us - either to our face or behind our back - there are some that are worth listening to, believing, taking in to ourselves, and retelling them to ourselves later. Like, for example, when my husband told me that I was a high-quality woman who knows what it takes to be a wife, and that all those women who I think are so beautiful or "have it all" are not high-quality and don't even compare to me. Or when a best friend toasts me at my wedding and tells me that it has been magical knowing me. Or, most importantly, the stories God has told me about myself - Jamsine, Eowyn, Iris, Aphrodite, phoenix, Athena, dove.
It is important to know which bad stories we tell ourselves are lies, and which are true. Because not everything about us is good. But then, it is even more important to find out and memorize the stories about ourselves that are good - and to redeem the bad stories by telling ourselves the good ones so often that the bad ones seem like a dream that you have trouble remembering upon waking.
And yet, it's just one day, or one week, in the timeline of my life. Tomorrow is a new day with a new story to write. But if I'm not careful, when I get up tomorrow, I'll remeber today's story, and be mentally in it as if it were still the present. See, we are constantly telling ourselves stories about ourselves. Sometimes they're true, sometimes they're not, and sometimes they're a good mix of both. But the point is, whenever we are subconsciously telling ourself a story, it is a story that we believe. And we act like it's true in the present moment, whether it is or not. The thing is, we can change the story whenever we want. Yes, all day today I felt blocked and unproductive. But if I tell myself that tomorrow, guess what? I'll be blocked and unproductive. If I tell myself that even now, as I'm writing this - I'll be blocked and uproductive. But if I tell myself, hey, that's not who I am - yes, that's how I was earlier today, but that's not who I am, then I give myself the option to be a different - but equally authentic (if not moreso) - version of myself. I've also been very efficient and productive before, and that's another story about myself that I have done and can do again.
It's the same with being a woman. There have been moments when I have felt "fully female" - but if I keep telling myself the story about the Joneen who is insecure, who feels intimitated by the prom queens, who feels like she should stick to the more tomboy side of life because she's better at it, then that's the Joneen I'll end up being. But that story is not who I am. It is who I have been at times. But I have also at times been a girl who felt graceful, womanly, accomplished, and even - once or twice - beautiful. If I tell myself the story about me when I felt like that, and tell myself it often enough, I will eventually be like that.
And while we shouldn't always listen to the stories others tell about us - either to our face or behind our back - there are some that are worth listening to, believing, taking in to ourselves, and retelling them to ourselves later. Like, for example, when my husband told me that I was a high-quality woman who knows what it takes to be a wife, and that all those women who I think are so beautiful or "have it all" are not high-quality and don't even compare to me. Or when a best friend toasts me at my wedding and tells me that it has been magical knowing me. Or, most importantly, the stories God has told me about myself - Jamsine, Eowyn, Iris, Aphrodite, phoenix, Athena, dove.
It is important to know which bad stories we tell ourselves are lies, and which are true. Because not everything about us is good. But then, it is even more important to find out and memorize the stories about ourselves that are good - and to redeem the bad stories by telling ourselves the good ones so often that the bad ones seem like a dream that you have trouble remembering upon waking.