No better time to feel sorry for yourself than when you are hiding out in the closet with your two dogs as a category 4 hurricane travels over your house. I guess this is a new first in my life. Never sat through a category 4 hurricane before. Why might you ask am I feeling sorry for myself? Part of it could be because I am sitting alone in my closet with two dogs as a category 4 hurricane passes overhead. Part of it could be hormones. I think part of it too is a lot of change has happened in my life. My friend from Ohio told me it is retrograde, and apparently, things will get better in 3 days. I suppose I should read up on that. I think too it has been lately I’ve been isolating myself from everyone. I feel like this all started with my friend whom I had a political argument with back in May, and we haven’t talked ever since. It seemed like the isolation started after that. Now, I feel disconnected from almost everyone in my life. That is a choice though. So, if there is hope in anything, it is that I am only as lonely as I chose to be. Next week for example (or maybe in a few weeks, as it may take some time for this area to recover), but soon, I can start getting myself out of the house. Just because I am getting my Ph.D. doesn’t mean I don’t have time for friends. I’m in a place where I need to make some new ones, and I can do that. It is my choice. I can choose to do nothing and be lonely and feel sorry for myself. Or I can choose to leave my house and try to make some new connections. I think I’ll go with the latter.
That is the one nice thing about life is all the choices we have. Sometimes that can be extremely overwhelming. Hence the reason my family has picked out every appliance I’ve bought in the last 10 years. I couldn’t even pick out my own toilet. It is too overwhelming. But those small choices can be empowering. For example, I track my food every day because I am trying to lose weight. I get a choice every day to listen to my timer on my phone for intermittent fasting…or not. I get a choice to go over my allotted calories for the day or do emotional eating and go over. All choices. Today, I can tell you, I didn’t abide by my fasting time. I’ve been worried all day about losing power. It’s been flickering a bit these last 30 minutes, but so far, I still have power. But regardless I wanted oatmeal and coffee before it went out, so I broke my fast. I’ve done a tad bit of emotional eating today as well, but I’m going to give myself a little grace considering I could die at any moment. Technically, I suppose we could die at any moment or day. But like literally my roof could be ripped off, or flood water could consume me at any moment. It is not a fantastical fear. It is legit what is happening outside right now. So yeah, today I get a little bit of grace.
Let’s do a little mind-dumping. Sometimes that helps. This probably won’t be pretty considering my hormones and emotional state. Do you ever feel like you are hard to love? I can be so incredibly tough on myself. Like there is some serious internal flaw in me so damaged and horrible that makes me completely unbearable and unlovable. What a fun thought right? It’s a bitch. I recently got into a new relationship. Relationships are hard for me. Romantic ones especially but even just friendships are very challenging. What I don’t want, is I just don’t want to overthink or overcomplicate or I don’t know, screw this relationship up somehow. In some respects, I am hopeful that because it is a long distance for several years that it may give me opportunities to work through some of the issues. I do think that distance will bring a good number of challenges as well. Am I going to be able to continue to grow as a person and as a partner in that time? Will I be able to manage my emotions and my perceptions? Will I be to accomplish all my other goals and have the patience I need to wait for this new life that awaits me? Will I have the courage to continue to put one foot in front of the other? Well, the storm is picking up now, so I am going to turn on another movie to drown out the noise. Perhaps I’ll write more later. Not sure if I’ll be able to post when the power/internet goes out. For anyone in this storm with me, I hope everyone is faring well. Wishing everyone love and peace in present moments.\
Shaynanigans 