I have realized that over the past 6 months or so I have done a lot of surviving and not a lot of living. I wish that I could say that it was necessary but I’m awake enough to realize that a good bit of it is hiding. So the question is what do I do about it?
I know that I could continue to live this life and get by but that is not what I want. I miss the passion in my life about work and creativity. I miss being bold and going places and doing things because I want to with or with out people.
I have used the excuse too long that I don’t know anything about this town or the surrounding area. All it takes to remedy that is gas and the GPS. I have come to realize that I am afraid to feel. Being an emotional person most of my life this feels odd but it is the only explanation for many of the things I have let happen.
I don’t “make” anything right now. I love photography and haven’t taken picture in month, it has been even longer since I picked up a pencil or a paint brush. I have written but it’s so easy to escape feelings in the esoteric meanings of words. It is not so easy to evade color, beauty or the memories linked to smell. Once I came to this realization I was shocked that I have spent months choosing not to feel.
That is not to say that I haven’t ranted or cried but I feel something deeper lurking just beyond the emotions I know I cn control. It makes me stop conversations and stay out of my study. I know that I need to address it and love myself through it but I seem to chicken out every time I feel it coming to the surface. I don’t want to be one of those people who hides in other words and yet here I am, reading books and watching tv instead of engaging myself.
So how do I break the pattern? How do I reach out to myself in a way that feels safe? By making a list.
Things to do this weekend and next week:
Cook all of my own food- on some very base level this is taking care of me.
TV no more that 1 hr per day- I need to play in the real word
Wake up every day @ 7am and use that hour doing something that is meaningful to me (blogging, praying, exercising)
Go outside!!! Even just a walk down the st.
Find a place in town that I want to go to and go there.
Make a list of all my unfinished art projects and work on one.
Take my camera anywhere and use it.
Some of you may wonder “what is the point in a list if you don’t do those things?” Well for me getting my thoughts together in some form and out of my head always helps. Also having a record so when I find myself in those unhappy prone to numbness moments there is a plan.
I want to thank those of you who have been encouraging me to be less of a victim and more of a survivor. Thank you for you words directly and through your writing. I know that I will get my head out of the sand and rediscover what makes my life amazing.
I must start by saying how sweet I think this is!!! Also that I’m not sure I deserve it. I have ready so many wonderful blogs that are really dedicated and half the time I feel that mine is all over the place. It’s nice to know that some where in all that rambling and hit and miss that it touched some of you and made a connection.
So here’s to the blogs that I read and some randomness about myself.
There are rules to getting awards.
1. Thank the people who give them to you and link to their blog.
http://nuggetsandpearls.wordpress.com/ (a wonderful spunky blog about life)
2. Next nominate 15 Bloggers for this award and notify them about the nomination. I’m not sure I follow 15 blogs but here goes:
http://brownpaperbaggirl.wordpress.com/
http://christinacronk.wordpress.com/
http://eviemariestewart.wordpress.com/
http://nuggetsandpearls.wordpress.com/
http://photographyfree4all.wordpress.com/
http://justramblinpier.wordpress.com/
http://altonwoods.wordpress.com/
http://bendedspoon.wordpress.com/
http://edenhills.wordpress.com/
http://ram0singhal.wordpress.com/
the un-named blog of my beloved friend
3. Finally, tell readers 7 things about yourself.
I am very defined as a “middle” child. I have one older brother and a younger sister. I classically fall into a peacemaker role in most situations in my life and I like being a caring, good listener kind of friend.
I have two cats, who pretty much take up my whole non-working world. In general I am passionate about animals but I could not imagine my life with out them
I was married and now I’m not. It has been the greatest lesson of my life.
I have no idea where I am going to “be” in the next year let along five. I used to be a teacher but now I work in an office. Who knows what the next bend will bring.
Mostly vegetarian (I know for you true veggies out there I’m not but I do my best) blood type a positive and all, it suites me.
I love making all kinds of stuff from sculptures to scrap-booking. I believe that creativity once tapped will over flow into any path it can find.
I am on the journey to find my bliss again. After the past year, I have done a lot of questioning and doubting. I think I’m finally getting ready to love myself and my life again.
For many of us watching a movie with an incredible score is what makes the film. The man behind so many of those moments is John William from E.T to the theme for the Olympics his has done it all and made history along the way.
I remember doing a project with my students about art and music. We listened to a double cd that I have of his music when the students tried to get inspiration from Kandinsky.
I quizzed them on what I considered very well-known pieces of cinema music and had a heavy heart when they could not recognize the original theme to Superman or the flying theme from E.T. In their defense they probably never saw either movie. But they did get Jaw, Hook and Jurassic Park.
I mention this project because we took the time to listen to each piece and though some where easily identified (The Imperial March from Star wars) there was plenty of room to talk about the different instruments and the mood they created. How you could tell by the first few moments if it was a theme, adventure or the bad guy. It was wonderful to share the gift of this amazing music with my students and I hope that you as well will be inspired to listen to the work of this amazing man.
I love this movie. It’s very fun but remember it was made in the 80′s so take it with a grain of salt. David Bowie sings and do numerous other bizarre creatures as Sara tires to get her brother back from the goblin king.
I love all the different placed they create in this world and the amazing puppeteering.
This one is scarier for small children and more on the philosophical side. There is a race of good people (the mystics) and a race of bad people (the Skeksis) and lone child or a race thought to be dead (the Gelflings) who is the key to discovering what has happened to this world.
I like the beautiful setting in this film. There are many different environment and cultures that the characters pass through and each is believable and unique. This film as also made some time ago, so if you only do fast paced this is probably not for you.
This is the story of a young girl who goes on a quest to find a cure for her ill mother. But little did she know she would have to go into another world to find it and then fight her way back to her own.
I love the crazy visuals and ideas in this story. It was done much later once CGI had started to be incorporated into these types of movies but there is still a lot of classical puppet work.
Where to begin…for the first time in the better part of a year I am starting to feel like myself again. I have my own place, stable employment and I’m not an emotional train wreck. So where do I go from here? I have had several interesting conversations in the last month or so that have me re-thinking “The Plan.”
To begin with I should state that “The Plan” has already had several revisions and was crafted in a time of utter confusion and emotional instability- hence the need for revisions. I started with something along the lines of “get the hell out of dodge!” this early stage had notions of running as far to the other coast as my little Neon would take me. Thank God my best friend made me sleep on that one.
Then it moved on to “Survive, we must keep safe.” So I focused on my job but in my semi crazy state any change made me even more neurotic and so I moved again. To a place with a little more space and a lot more issues. Finally, I reached “Remember how to breathe.” This actually being the most challenging phase of the transition to reclaiming my life. Without the distractions of pain and survival to take up my waking thoughts and am now faced with the wonderful question of “What do “I” want to do with my life?”
The obvious answer would be to double my salary and go back to teaching. But after five minuets of logical thought I know that is not the answer. Because the truth is that I loved my students more than I loved my subject or teaching itself. And I know that I cannot go back to throwing myself into a life that is empty or diminishing. So I am left to ponder what kind of life/do I want?
In my head I can see a new path for myself and at the same time I have a lot of nagging voices saying things like “You went to school for five years to throw it all away? You want to go to night/correspondence school? isn’t that just a rip off?” But deep in my heart I know that I cannot go back to teaching and I cannot stay where I am either. My life here is good but it is only a stepping stone to real health and stability in my life. And I realize that I could pack up and move across the US and probably be okay now but I would be doing something that I don’t love in the name of money and I am not that kind of person.
I’m not saying that I won’t work a job I don’t “love,” I’m saying that I will not dedicated more than a year of my life to it if there is not an end goal and I think that is what I have finally found. So I’m going back to school to be a Vet Assistant. Other than teenagers my other great life long passion a has been animals. In fact I almost went to college for zoo keeping.
I know if you have been reading my old blogs you’re thinking “wasn’t she writing a book?” and I was and have. But I also realize that I have to eat, and the writing will always be there waiting for me. I know the “real” writer’s are rolling their eyes and rightly so. I am not a real writer. I am a person who loves stories. Real writers write when there is no bread. Get up and do it every day and don’t wait for inspiration and that is not me. All I will say in my defense is that the birth of my would be novel is very much rooted in the death of my marriage and for now they are too closely bound.
There are many things that I am just awakening to. I took my first pictures in months of my bran new niece. It felt good to do something creative but I feel myself holding back. I know I am afraid to open the door. Anyone who works in a creative way knows that whether you mean it too or not your life ends up on the page, canvas or plate. It is the nature of creativity and there is a part of my the is still scared.
This is step one: imagine a different life. I was talking with a friend when I realized in some small way I already have done this. When I used to sit in my best-friends house crippled by a broken heart I would dream about the place I knew I would one day have. I saw an open room with lots of light a large window and I felt happy there. The other day I realized that I was already there. Sitting in my living room with the sliding glass door open to the balcony. Light streamed in on my two cats blissing out. I smiled looking at the tree just beyond and realized I was home. That place I had dreamed about finding was here.
Now I have to dream a bigger dream, one where I’m not just safe and stable: one where I am creative and passionate, one where I am brave and bold and not afraid to try again and again because I and worth it. My dreams are worth it and I still have lots and lots of time to be and do what-ever I decide. I’m about to be 32 and I am starting over- Yay me!!!
I have realized that over the past 6 months or so I have done a lot of surviving and not a lot of living. I wish that I could say that it was necessary but I’m awake enough to realize that a good bit of it is hiding. So the question is what do I do about it?
