The Yearly Reckoning...Not!

New Year's Eve once more, and I find myself not at all reflective or seeking closure of the year just past. Unusual for me, but at the moment, it seems like such an arbitrary thing, to say this is the last day of the year and so you must reflect, sum up, list accomplishments, and set goals for the coming year.

It seems so very contrived...life is a dynamic process, and it doesn't always fit into those nice, neat little boxes that you can stack in alphabetized (or colour-coded, for the more visual among us) rows.

So this year I'm going to do something I never do...I'm going to poo-poo the Yearly Reckoning. No lists of accomplishments (I swear that's a lingering side effect of spending twelve years in academia with that whole publish-or-perish imperative), no goal setting, no angst about how little I've actually done. Instead, there will merely be a nod to the new calendar, and a desperate attempt to remember to write "2009" on my checks...

Writing Prompt: Do you have an end of the year ritual? What is it? Why is it important to you? If you don't have one, why not?

Reflections on the Moon

Last night, after a quick thunderstorm had cleared the air and the clouds had moved out, I went out into the front yard, perched on a rock and stared up at the moon. I have always felt drawn to the moon, but it is a very subtle sort of feeling. I feel certain that our bodies, made of so much water as they are, must be subtly affected by something that is powerful enough to influence the very oceans of our world.

We have uncovered so much of what is hidden, and now we probe the secrets of the cosmos itself...I wonder how we will feel when it is all laid out in cold hard numbers, and all the mysteries are gone. Will the lives of those future people seem empty and hollow because there is nothing left to marvel at? Or are there some mysteries that we will never solve?

I think it would be better if there were. I think humankind needs mysteries.

Writing Prompt: What mysteries do you find yourself drawn to? Why do you think you are drawn to them?

Pandora's Box

"Instead of elders, we now have elected politicians who speak with corrupt and self-serving voices; instead of fragrant local wisdom we have homogeneous civil law and institutionalized religion to guide us." --Caitlin Matthews, "The Celtic Spirit"

I often find myself yearning for a different time, a simpler time, when we lived in harmony with the turning of the earth. Although technology has done much to improve our lives, in many way it has also impoverished us. The society we live in is driven by the holy dollar, and there seems to be very little room here for the idea of the "common good".

Our media-driven culture teaches us from infancy that the most important people in our world are those who have everything and look good...not those who have the wisdom to guide us and have lived in the world long enough to speak from experience.

We live in a world where human connections are transient, fragile, and even unnecessary. Families are separated by oceans and divorce is easy with no real consequences.

I'm not saying the world was perfect before all this technology came along. I think that in many ways it was a harder, grimmer place. But I think there was much more of a sense of family and a sense of community.

We may have gained a lot in our technological achievements, but I think we have lost a lot, too. We have an entire nation full of lost people with empty lives, many of them popping antidepressant medications because they know that something is wrong...they're just not sure what.

I'm not sure what the answers are, though. All our technology is like Pandora's Box, and there's no stuffing it back inside and slamming the lid shut once it's out there. Perhaps part of the answer lies in listening to what's really in our hearts and stop letting other people tell us what we think.

Writing Prompt: What does your heart tell you about how to live an authentic life? What kind of life resonates with your inner self?

Knowing When to Slow Down

Part of being well and staying well is knowing how to pace yourself. Sometimes we load too much on our plates and then we get stressed out and don't do any of the things we're trying to do to our satisfaction.

My sleep is still disturbed after my trazodone withdrawal, and I'm trying not to take anything to help because I feel like then I'm just trading one chemical for another. As a result, I'm a little more tired than usual, and a little less alert.

I think I need to slow down and be kinder to my body and mind.

I am not doing well with coming up with anything to say today. In addition to it being summer and having the kids home all day and needing attention, I have a couple of other projects going--coming up with the curriculum notes for my journal class this fall, and working on a book about bipolar disorder and wellness strategies. I think I need to post a bit more sporadically...so I will try to get something up a few times a week, but I think I need to slow down a little...I'm running out of steam, I don't want to push myself so hard that I end up dropping the blog entirely. I'll still be visiting your blogs, but I don't think I can keep up the pace I've set so far!

Writing Prompt: How do you know when you are trying to do too much? What signals does you body give you? What signals does your mind give you? Do you listen?

Life Lessons

Little Mouse's birthday was over the weekend, and one of the gifts she got was an "Action Replay"--a special cartridge for her hand-held video game machine (Nintendo DS for those of you in the know). Action Replay is a product that contains all the different "cheat codes" for the video games you can play on the DS, which means that she can get unlimited money or have already caught all the critters she's supposed to catch, or what have you.

So she eagerly entered all the cheat codes for her favorite game, and spent most of the day crowing at her brother, "Look, I've got this! And this!" and "Look, I've got enough money to buy this! I bet you've never gotten so much money!"

Saturday night, after she'd gone to bed (seriously over-tired from the very late night she had Friday, and the short nights Wednesday and Thursday when she was so excited about the impending birthday that she couldn't sleep), she came downstairs in tears and told me how terrible she felt about cheating in her game. She said she felt like she'd done something wrong, and that the game wasn't going to be any fun anymore because she already had everything, and what was the point of playing anymore?

I pulled her onto my lap and hugged her and told her she hadn't done anything wrong, but that maybe she'd learned something? We talked about how we need to have goals and challenges to keep things interesting, and that if you're just handed everything you ever wanted, it's hard to stay motivated to do anything because you have nothing to strive for...and how that's as true in life as it is in video games.

She said her game was ruined now, and that she was going to start over because it just wasn't any fun anymore. Then she dried her eyes and hugged me, and I walked her back upstairs and tucked her back into bed.

I was smiling as I walked back downstairs. What a great opportunity to teach an important life lesson. I hope she remembers it and takes something from it.

Writing Prompt: What is one of the important life lessons you have learned? How did you learn it? Did you realize at the time that it was a valuable learning experience, or did that understanding come later?

Writing as Meditation

My friend Gianna over at Beyond Meds was up at 3 am last night writing out her anxieties over a trip she is taking this morning. Her post got me thinking about all of the times I have done exactly that--sat down feeling all wound up about something, scrawled my anxieties or pain or fear (or sometimes all three) across several notebook pages, and come out on the other side feeling, if not better, at least better able to handle the situation.

I don't think you have to be a writer or a long-time believer in the power of journaling to benefit from this sort of catharsis. I think that a torrent of words at the right time can have extremely healing and beneficial effects. I have used writing when I've been in the middle of a difficult situation. Writing helps me sort out what, exactly, is going on, and what, exactly, I'm reacting to. And it helps me figure out what I might do to ease my way through whatever it is I'm going through. It's something you can do, as opposed to just letting events take you where they will...and I'm all about doing something when I'm in the midst of a crisis.

And that's fine for those highly emotional moments when you just need to get it out. But what about for the everyday parts of your life? I have found writing to be an excellent form of meditation. Julia Cameron talks about writing as a form of meditation in the books from her "Artist's Way" series, which include "The Artist's Way", "Walking in this World", and "Finding Water", and also in some of her other books, including "Vein of Gold". Cameron calls it Morning Pages, and Morning Pages are three pages of longhand writing that you do every morning, first thing. They don't have to mean anything, they don't have to be about anything, they don't have to be pretty or spelled right, because nobody is going to see them but you. They are basically a brain dump. Whatever's on your mind, put it down, and you don't ever have to look at it again if you don't want to. It's about the process, not the product. My Morning Pages are usually pretty banal: I can't believe it's morning already. I wish I was still in bed. There is too much to do today and I don't want to do any of it: vacuuming, laundry, grocery shopping...I absolutely don't want to grocery shop because that means I have to figure out what we're going to eat and I don't know what we're going to eat because those kids won't eat anything...

Writing in this way, every morning, feels like meditation. It's part of my routine. It sets me up for the day. I come away from it feeling refreshed and ready to start my day. I suppose it does take a bit longer than your ten-minute mindfulness meditation... but for me, writing is how I make sense of my world, and so for me, writing is a perfect form of meditation.

Writing Prompt: Set aside twenty minutes or so and do a brain dump. Just write whatever is on your mind no matter how mundane or boring. Even if you have nothing to say, write that. The trick is to just keep your hand moving the pen across the page for twenty minutes. When you have finished, sit in silence for a few moments and ask yourself how you feel. Do you feel more collected? Less scattered? Consider whether or not a morning brain-dump might be a helpful thing to add to your arsenal of wellness tools.

You Are What You Eat

Naturalgal has been running a series on foods that are healthy and foods to avoid. Reading her work and talking with my psychiatrist the other day got me thinking...

I find it interesting that my psychiatrist has never asked me about my diet. Nor does he have any interest in which supplements I am taking. Now, admittedly I'm not taking anything exotic, but so many substances that are marketed as "supplements" have the potential to cause harm or interact with psych meds that I find it curious that he does not ask.

It strikes me that part of the reason most psychiatrists don't want to look too closely at diet is that the typical western diet is so bad for you that for most people, eating healthier would mean a huge lifestyle change. And let's face it, it's easier to get people to take a pill every day than it is to get them to change their habits.

But all of the brain chemicals involved in psychiatry's pet theory of chemical imbalance--namely the neurotransmitters like serotonin and dopamine--are made by the body from the materials it has at hand, meaning whatever has gone into the mouth recently. And so it makes sense to me (although I am not a biochemist or a nutritionist) that if you are giving your body junk for building blocks, the quality (and quantity) of the things it can make from those building blocks may not be optimal.

Looking at all the junk that's out there on the shelves at the grocery store, it amazes me that the average human lifespan keeps increasing. Our bodies are extremely resilient, and they'll keep running for a long time, even if we do fill them with crap. But damage is occurring whether we notice it or not.

Maybe if our bodies just balked and stop performing when we ate junk--like a car with a gas tank full of water--then we'd all be a lot more mindful about what we put in our mouths.

Writing Prompt: While our bodies need good food to run optimally, our minds/souls/spirits also need to be nourished. What things do you do to nourish your spirit and keep it healthy? Could you do more? Are there things you'd like to try but haven't? What things get in the way of nourishing yourself?

Rituals

Our lives are made up of a series of connecting moments, and it brings us a sense of comfort, safety, and continuity to engage in rituals--the little things we do that bring a sense of familiarity to a moment.

One of my favorite rituals is my morning tea and journal writing. Every morning after I have done the necessary things, which during summer break means walking and feeding the dogs, and preparing the Chief's lunch, I make a cup of Celestial Seasoning's Chocolate Caramel Enchantment Chai with a drop of honey (okay, a bit more than a drop, but somewhat less than a splash), and sit quietly at the table and write in my journal. The "quietly" part is negotiable during summer break, but I still sit there and do it, even if I am surrounded by noise. It has become the way I start my day, and if I can't do it for whatever reason, the day always feel somehow "off" or "wrong."

In our house, we have birthday rituals (Birthday Breakfast, which is doughnuts from the local bakery) on people's birthdays, and we have our holiday rituals such as kids jumping into bed with us on Christmas morning to open their stockings.

Writing Prompt: A ritual can be something you do every day, every week, or even just once a year. What rituals do you use to bring a sense of comfort and familiarity to the moments of your life?

On Kindness

I was very sad to see that Gianna at Beyond Meds will not be blogging any longer due to cruel comments left on her blog. I cannot understand what drives some people to behave as badly as these anonymous commenters have. All I can do is shake my head and wonder at the state of this world...and ask myself WTF I was thinking, bringing children into it.

Years ago I read something about thinking before you speak, and it touched me. I cannot recall where I read it, or who wrote it, but I wrote it out on a notecard and stuck it on my fridge for my kids to read when they need a reminder.

We could all do worse than to follow its advice:

Ask yourself before you speak (or comment on someone's blog):
Is this true?
Is it kind?
Is it necessary?

It's All About the Journey

Naturalgal had an interesting post up yesterday in which she talks about plugging along with things like weight loss or psych-med withdrawal, and Gianna had a post up the other day where she discussed dealing with pain, whether it be physical or emotional. Both of these posts have something to say about process vs. product, journey vs. destination.

So often, we focus on the Next Big Goal, whether it be losing thirty pounds, becoming medication-free or pain-free, buying our dream home, getting a new job, or whatever it happens to be. So focused that we forget about the journey--how we get there and what we do along the way.

When you're losing weight, the goal is to be fit and trim, but what so many people don't seem to realize is that reaching the goal isn't enough--if you've crashed the weight off, you haven't learned better habits along the way, and you aren't going to be able to maintain your ideal weight for very long. It makes more sense to shift your perspective to the journey and learn healthy habits that you can maintain for a lifetime. It's a slower process, but the results will be long-term.

The same applies to coming off of psych meds. The goal is to be medication free, and it may seem that the fastest way to achieve that is to just stop taking the medication. However, doing that can be dangerous, and withdrawal symptoms can leave you worse off than when you started. It's important to go slowly and allow your body time to adjust. Gianna has some excellent resources for psychiatric drug withdrawal at her blog, Beyond Meds.

As far as pain goes, focusing on how long it will be until the pain goes away can make the whole process seem so much worse. If you can shift your focus to making it through this moment, somehow that's not as hard to manage as making it through the next hour, or until the pain meds kick in, or until the headache is gone. I've used this shift of focus to help get me through the most horrendous migraines, and it does help.

What I'm really talking about here is mindfulness--being fully present in the moment rather than focusing solely on what's going to happen at some future time.

I have a friend who is always thinking about the Next Big Thing, which, of course, is going to make her life perfect. And when the Next Big Thing arrives and fails to do so, she is disappointed...until she decides what the next Next Big Thing is. She lives her life in the grip of a never-ending cycle of anticipation and disappointment. Sometime in the future when she's sitting on the front porch in her rocker covered with grandchildren, I wonder what she will remember about her life. That everything was a disappointment?

I would rather recall a series of moments, lived for what they are, than a series of disappointments.