Tag: showing up

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Being what you are does not make a change.

tec

It’s never any surprise to me that the universe continually shows up for me.

I will never stop finding it both amusing and fascinating, even amidst the heartache.

R’s session shook me. I kept feeling compelled to have the whys and the hows or even the minutest detail or example. I wanted to know how she could possibly feel this way and how I could possibly fix it. I had question after question. I wanted to be heard. And validated.

The funny thing about having had so much therapy and actively pursuing personal growth and having so much self-awareness is that all the questions just make me make that squished up face. That feeling of “I wanna put the square peg in the round hole but obviously that’s not gonna work but lemme try to quasi attempt it this way and I know it’s pointless, but, like, if I can match them up juuuuuust right then….maybe…”

The problem is I want to ask all the wrong people the questions. Because I want to be validated. Because I don’t want to be seen as what I’m not. Because of my disbelief. Because it hurts to show up over and over and be pushed away and to show up more and, at the end of the day, have all that showing up feel to someone else the exact opposite of what it was to me.

They aren’t the right people tho.

All of my reasoning and logic and personal growth tell me that my daughter and her therapist are not to be my source of validation.

It’s moot. No matter how much it hurts and no matter how much I want to stomp my feet.

So after we left the appointment I shut up. And I didn’t burden my already hurting 16 year old with my pains. And I told the voices in my head to fuck off. And I considered, “If she views me as the person in her life who has made her feel worthless, despite all my effort to the exact contrary, does it change anything? Would I call it quits on her because her lens is skewed? Would I throw guilt and resentment her way because her translator is broken? Would I go against my who merely because this hurts so damn much?”

Nope. Nope times infinity. Nope to the core of my being.

So when I ran into the store on the way home, I bought her a succulent. Because she said she feels invisible. And you can’t buy things for invisible people. Thereby practically saying, “You aren’t invisible, girl. I see you. Take this tiny succulent and know I love you. I am here.”

And then I went home and called my sponsor.

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For all the roads you followed.

tec

There’s a thing I do with food. To not make things about food.

I decide.

It’s not always easy. But it’s simple.

And the more times I do it, the more often it is just easy.

In November I decided to intermittent fast and have my window be 9am til 7pm. Soon I decided to changed it to noon til 7. That felt okay until no behavior changed beyond the decision.

Enter more decisions.

The last couple weeks I’ve really driven into not only who I want to be, but who I am. Not only entertaining what my future ideal self would say, but also what I want to say right here, right now.

I don’t want it to be so grueling. I don’t want it to have to be so hard.

So I decide.

And then I execute the decision.

An eating window always benefitted me because once I had food, a switch turned on in my head and I couldn’t “off” food. I didn’t off food. But the eating window just shortens the issue. It doesn’t address it.

After weeks of thinking “what would the future, ideal Jill do?” and sometimes answering honestly, and sometimes fooling myself, I finally realized it was all just a stopgap.

It’s all important and I’ve needed it all as part of my journey. But I need something that feels more sturdy. I need something that makes all the chatter dissipate. I need the quiet.

Deciding helps bring me more quiet.

So I eat my meal and then I make the conscious decision “Don’t eat anything else for an hour.” And then I execute it.

I focus my energy and action elsewhere. I write or clean or play or move my body. I do the thing that quiets my mind.

And eventually I eat again. And then I decide. And then I execute it.

There’s no stomping or loss or grief. It feels like healing.

It’s not easy. But it’s easier than it was last week. And it’ll be easier still. I’m not ignoring myself or my feelings. I’m not distracting myself or skipping out. I’m just choosing to thrive in growth instead of drown in food.

It’s a perfectly imperfect system. I’m no robot. This is about being human here. I get tripped up and I go again. Getting back up is just as vital as decide and execute. Getting back up is decide and execute.

I know that in time, as consistency lends to routine, and routine turns to habit, it will be the foundation that changes the behavior, which is the whole point. It will be the answer to the question “what would future, ideal Jill say?” that I’ll no longer have to stop and ask myself. Because I’ll just know. Because I’ll just be.

adventures in quarantine, Adventures in running, Uncategorized

Anything but empty.

tec

I let the universe take care of me today. I let the people who love me turn my day around.

After I posted earlier, I went outside with the boys, but it wasn’t enough. My body needed to move. My mind needed to turn off. I employed R’s help with L and took off. I wasn’t even intending to run. I just needed to move.

I walked the first half, and then, suddenly, down a hill, barely with permission from my mind, my body started running. Experience tells me it was probably a minute thirty. It felt so good. Then I took off again after a short walk and that was probably 45 seconds. Then came the section I ran last night in two minutes. Today I timed it and it was a minute 45 and I didn’t want to forfeit the fifteen seconds, so I ran more. And then more. And again.

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Fucking two thirty! Amazing.

I needed a little extra walking time, so I added another side street, making the walk almost two miles.

I got home and my Chris was there, celebrating right alongside me. Fistbump explosions for days. Beaming with pride.

And then he let me just vent about my feelings. And then we came in and I needed to give a very dirt-covered L a bath. And I wasn’t expecting the company, but the company felt so fucking good and Chris and I just sat in the bathroom and kept talking while L took his bath.

He showed up for me so hard today. It means everything.

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The voice that’s been calling me back home.

tec

I had a panic attack this afternoon.

I feel compelled to write about it because I learned a lot of things. First, a panic attack is not failure. It is a lesson learned. Second, it’s not weakness. It is an opportunity to see how strong you were for so long until something got too big. Third, for me, it was a chance to see how far I’ve come.

In months and years past, a catalyst would have been icing on a cake that propelled me into yelling and shaming and damaging my relationships with the people I love the most.

Today, because of constant work I’ve poured into self-improvement, I felt all of the overwhelm, but I walked away. Never did I fall into a victim mentality because “no one helps me”. Nor did I walk toward anyone and spew venom. I didn’t do irreparable damage.

First, I asked myself why it hurt so much that it feels like my family isn’t showing up for me. And I listened. The answer was, even tho I’ve been showing up for myself, today I went a little too far showing up for someone else and it was at my expense. I hurt because I was mad at myself for not setting a better boundary.

Next, I asked myself why it hurt so much that I didn’t feel looked after. I listened for an answer. The answer was that, while it would be cool to have my family, or more specifically Chris, just omnisciently show up for me, it’s not reasonable. And just because sometimes I catch the glimmer of a grimace that he’s in pain and should ice his shoulder doesn’t mean he should catch all my cues. Hell, I may not even have clues. (And there are totally times I miss Chris’s clues.) Therefore, the answer to my question is that when I have needs, I need to voice those needs.

Today I had a panic attack and I invited Chris to sit with me. He showed up for me. I did it with him by my side. I didn’t have to feel alone.

Showing up for myself doesn’t just mean I run on run days no matter what. Part of showing up for myself means I tell other people what I need. I utilize my support system and let others help me when I need help.

Of course, it also means I get quiet and ask myself what I need. And then I listen and follow through.

I could view my panic attack today as a failure. Well. No. I can’t even do that. I don’t even have the mindset to view it that way anymore. I’ll say instead that, plain and simple, I had a panic attack today and it was a huge growth development moment for me.

Adventures in running, Uncategorized

Who I’m meant to be.

tec

New goals met!! 30 second run/30 second walk. 20 minutes!! (5 min warm up/cool down)

*times will now include warmup/cooldown…probably…

Running for that long was so challenging! There were so many thoughts bouncing around in my head. My left ankle tendon throbs! Slow breathe in; slow breathe out. Follow through–heel to toe. Am I standing up straight? Do I have good form? Slow dowwwwwnn.

But also it is exhilarating moving my body like that! I can’t wait til jogging builds enough endurance that I can maintain long running strides.

Yesterday I decided I would do either 20 or 25 second runs, but at the last minute today I decided for 30 with a 15 minute duration. Five minutes into the run I decided I’d do 25 total with the warmup and cooldown. It felt so freaking good.

This week I commit to writing out a two week training plan. Today I downloaded the C25K app, mostly because I didn’t want to have to create my own plan. But their week 1 is run 60 seconds and I’m not there yet. So this week I’ll write out a plan for the next couple weeks and then hopefully I’ll be able to pick up their week 1 on my week 4.

I don’t have a solid timetable or deadline for being ready to do my 5K. Before summer’s end. For now I just want to run and get stronger and go for longer. I can’t convey how gratifying it feels that I already feel progress!

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Trace the moment.

tec

Chris and I have a perfect place. He found it first. He shared it with me. It’s this little tucked away place that doesn’t even feel like it’s part of our town. Or our state. It’s our sacred place. It’s hitsuzen. We have to have a certain kind of weather for it tho and winter is often not it.

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A couple weeks ago it was perfect outside tho. Still snow on the ground, but the bike path was almost entirely clear of snow and ice. The air was crisp, but the sun was so warm that it didn’t matter.

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Despite the fact that the car had been making this weird noise, we risked the 20 minute drive to go for the walk. It was worth it to get that kind of time in that kind of place. A place that brings us back to ourselves. For me, it doesn’t bring me back to an older, idealized version of me or an older, iidealized version of Chris. It just always brings us to a more grounded place of our present selves. I think that’s what I always love most about it. The everything else falls away and we’re stripped down to our purest, naked selves and we can just be.

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We walked for maybe an hour and munched clementines and kiwi. We showed L all the cool things we love and he ooh’d and ahh’d the 50 foot wall cliff and the train tracks and the river and the trees.

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We stopped and marveled the sewer/tunnel pipe and L made up stories about it coming out into the river. And then he sang songs as we walked on.

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The day before this walk, we walked too. The weather begged our presence. Our relationship begged connection. We showed up. It’s the greatest thing we can do.

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We always walk back to us. This season has been filled with ebb and flow and pain and growth. Distance and connection. Falling away and coming back. As the earth warms again, I feel a tingling of change. There’s a buzz my skin feels. A fire sparking. Despite the ebbs–and there will always be ebbs–I can feel the flow’s energy building up momentum.

Yesterday Chris and I had a…discordance. It wasn’t an argument. It was just….an overwhelm of feelings and thoughts and fears. It was vulnerability and anxiety and honesty. In years’ past, it would have broken us. It would have been a full on argument. It would have been irreconcilable for hours, the day, the weekend. It would have been the thing that, Chris especially, wouldn’t have been able to navigate through. (I say Chris especially because for the most part, I lean toward compartmentalizing as an involuntary coping mechanism. I’m not bragging here…)

But yesterday, because we’ve both had so much growth–because he is diligently searching to reclaim his self–it was only discordance and an exchange. The moment of ebb made the subsequent flow that much more energized. It was like reaching hitsuzen without the walk.

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Illuminate the blackest nights.

tec

It’s fascinating what a difference a day makes.

Thursday was a day. Thursday was such a day. It hurt. It was also a day of growth that propelled me into today. Maximum amount of growth from a maximum type of experience.

This morning someone said something that reminded what Chris and my communication looked like at the start of our relationship. There was an obscene amount of us being present for one conversation, but experiencing two wholly different conversations. Our very different sets of experiences and baggage provided very skewed filtered translations of our words.

I’d repeat back to him what he said, but really what I was repeating back was what I heard (how I translated it), and he wouldn’t understand what the hell I was talking about. Or worse yet, I’d tell him and he’d get mad I took it that way, which only served to make me feel more terrible. Or sometimes I would have said something once and maybe even off cuff, and then a year later he’d be like “well, I’ve never done this thing because this one time you said you didn’t like it”…. and I’d have no recollection of saying that and would have had no issue with this random thing he wanted to do, but had never done.

We spent a lot of time navigating that. Until we maybe didn’t have to navigate it so much? And we were just on the same page most of the time.

And then life, as it is wont to do, got bigger and deeper and more layered. And perhaps we took the communication for granted and the translators surfaced again unbeknownst to either of us.

There are things that I felt on Thursday–things I wrote–that are totally valid. And then there are other things that were filtered through a broken translator. Things that were filtered through pain I have compartmentalized and avoided. It doesn’t make them any less valid. It doesn’t make them any less real. It just makes them…not the truth.

Part of the defective translator is my long past experiences and apparently not having properly explored them. There have been times I felt slighted or dismissed or overlooked and I react from those moments. Not because I’m mad. But because it hurts. I support him because it’s in my nature to do so. I want to feel it in return. He is supportive in other ways, but it’s not the same to me.

Another aspect is a fresh wound. The fresh wound has been something I haven’t wanted to peel the bandaid off of to look at yet. I haven’tbeen ready. I don’t know what I’ll find exactly and also I don’t know whose help I’ll need to employ. Will a nurse do? Or do I need a surgeon? Can the wound be cleaned and heal with time or is the whole limb a lost cause? Will the body survive the loss of limb? So, I keep the bandaid on.

And mostly it is fine.

Every now and again “mostly” leaves and “not fine” shows up.

For now, I know that no matter the solution I choose for healing it, I need to make the choice soon.

I tangented tho. The point I was wanting to make is that Thursday I translated communication through my pain (and maybe Chris translated through his something as well) and I was inaccurate. He didn’t think the enneagram was stupid and he didn’t think me stupid for having interest in it. He took a quiz today and listened to some of the Rise Together podcast episode about it and seemed genuinely interested in it, just the way that I hoped. And I hoped it because he is such a bright light and for too long he has been trying to dim himself.

And I guess now begins some me/us work because all the things I’m feeling and protecting just under the surface only serve to dim bright light as well.

I’m nothing if not the girl who finally catches up to remember I practice what I preach.