Lent Chronicle - Epilogue
I think overall this Lent went well. I didn't post much about it towards the end, mostly because I was studying and getting ready for Austria, then I was IN Austria, which was fantastic.
Despite not always following through with "being mindful" I have been thinking about it a lot. It's hard to keep on track when I get worked up about things though. For example, there was a bit of a schmozzle with my baggage on the trip home and I feel like I got more upset about it then I needed to. I feel ok now, but I couldn't stop focusing on the loss of my stuff. I can't tell where the worthy feelings end and where my own criticism of my reactions begins. I know that I make things worse by dwelling on the fact that I can't control my emotions, and how that makes me weak and how people will not want to be around me anymore if I can't get better, and it just goes on and on.
I listened to a TED talk by one of my favorite authors this morning and it's had me thinking about it all day. She talked about how to come back after a failure, or a great success. The way she expressed it, her failures and her successes take her away from where she is most comfortable or fulfilled, where she is doing what she loves. She said it was like her brain couldn't tell the difference between success and failure, it only felt the absolute value of how far it was from center, and that success can end up having a lot of the same feelings as failure. Her advise, was to come back to the thing that you love to do, the thing that you love more than yourself. I don't know what that is for me.
I feel like there are a lot of things that I do that make me feel comfortable, but that are definitely not things that I love to do. They are compulsive things, which is how this whole Lent thing started and really, I have been trying to be more cognizant of my actions for a long time now. It feels like the ever-present perfectionism under a different name.
Before I had a computer, I listened to the radio. I sewed my own clothing and I made stuff. I wrote in journals; often. And those things gave me energy and made me feel good. I want to go back to doing that, but I just can't seem to give up the mind-numbing internet-surfing, or movie-watching. It's like as I kept moving and pruning down the things that I had been carrying around, I also stopped making room for vital creative space. I have been making excuses for a long time that school takes precedence, or before that, I worked a job that I let drain every once of me until there was nothing left to create with. I just keep telling myself that in a "while" my circumstances will change and I'll have more time for that "later."
At present I am really happy with my life. I am going to school and learning (Learning is a thing that I love. The first time that I felt calm since I landed this weekend was when I was studying and writing my final exam this morning. I felt really good, I love learning.) I am in love and I am loved. I live in a beautiful city. I am successful and overall, my life has been on an upward trend for a few years now. I just can't seem to let go of the old me, the victim-me. I don't know what a new me looks like and the old me is always holding on for dear life. I just want to kill her so that she's gone altogether and I'm a new person without any of those faults. I know this is not realistic, or necessarily even wise.
That's all for now.
Despite not always following through with "being mindful" I have been thinking about it a lot. It's hard to keep on track when I get worked up about things though. For example, there was a bit of a schmozzle with my baggage on the trip home and I feel like I got more upset about it then I needed to. I feel ok now, but I couldn't stop focusing on the loss of my stuff. I can't tell where the worthy feelings end and where my own criticism of my reactions begins. I know that I make things worse by dwelling on the fact that I can't control my emotions, and how that makes me weak and how people will not want to be around me anymore if I can't get better, and it just goes on and on.
I listened to a TED talk by one of my favorite authors this morning and it's had me thinking about it all day. She talked about how to come back after a failure, or a great success. The way she expressed it, her failures and her successes take her away from where she is most comfortable or fulfilled, where she is doing what she loves. She said it was like her brain couldn't tell the difference between success and failure, it only felt the absolute value of how far it was from center, and that success can end up having a lot of the same feelings as failure. Her advise, was to come back to the thing that you love to do, the thing that you love more than yourself. I don't know what that is for me.
I feel like there are a lot of things that I do that make me feel comfortable, but that are definitely not things that I love to do. They are compulsive things, which is how this whole Lent thing started and really, I have been trying to be more cognizant of my actions for a long time now. It feels like the ever-present perfectionism under a different name.
Before I had a computer, I listened to the radio. I sewed my own clothing and I made stuff. I wrote in journals; often. And those things gave me energy and made me feel good. I want to go back to doing that, but I just can't seem to give up the mind-numbing internet-surfing, or movie-watching. It's like as I kept moving and pruning down the things that I had been carrying around, I also stopped making room for vital creative space. I have been making excuses for a long time that school takes precedence, or before that, I worked a job that I let drain every once of me until there was nothing left to create with. I just keep telling myself that in a "while" my circumstances will change and I'll have more time for that "later."
At present I am really happy with my life. I am going to school and learning (Learning is a thing that I love. The first time that I felt calm since I landed this weekend was when I was studying and writing my final exam this morning. I felt really good, I love learning.) I am in love and I am loved. I live in a beautiful city. I am successful and overall, my life has been on an upward trend for a few years now. I just can't seem to let go of the old me, the victim-me. I don't know what a new me looks like and the old me is always holding on for dear life. I just want to kill her so that she's gone altogether and I'm a new person without any of those faults. I know this is not realistic, or necessarily even wise.
That's all for now.