Three more things

I knew if I didn't post before I left for my eye exam today, the day would get away from me. I didn't, and it did. Still, today's post should be pretty simple.

Around October 2015 I was writing about problems and wants that I had and things that I needed to do, and I shared that and started working on those things. It certainly was an outgrowth of the Long Reading List and other things, but it was also its own phase. Some good things happened as I worked on it.

It is an amazing thing to like myself now. Although I needed to get past believing that there was something inherently lacking in me, figuring that out didn't automatically change the feelings. That took some time. Given that time, though, I have grown. While there has definitely been growth during this time of unemployment and care-giving, there are also parts of it that might have been impossible without what I had already done.

I have also found some improvement in family relations, which is not only dear to my heart but at times seemed impossible.

When my computer died and I lost all my data, that included the spreadsheet where I was tracking my progress on those specific areas. I have not been able to completely recreate that, but I know that there are three specific areas that I still had to work on. Those are the ones that are firmly in my mind. They are the ones that I know I need, and so I hope they might be the ones that allow me to move to the next phase of my life, which I hope will be the phase with less poverty.

There is always some fear, because one big source of stress is my mother's condition, and there is pretty much only one way for that to end. There are no happy thoughts there. It is easy to get stalled on that. If I am perfectly candid, part of what made the difficulties mentioned yesterday so hard was that along with the time needed for regeneration I also needed some time to grieve. She lost some ground after the hospital stay, and some of it doesn't look like it will be coming back. That always requires some adjustments to our routines, but also it requires some time to mourn a little.

I suppose one of the key growth areas required has been learning that there are things that I can't fix, though I had gotten really used to fixing things and taking care of things in my life before. I can be grateful for the good that has come through this, and I will learn to be grateful for what comes, but I know there are hard times ahead, and I am not at all eager for that.

Nonetheless, there are those three things that I know I haven't really gotten to yet, and I can be eager to do those, and believe that good things will come from them.

One is driving. I will not be able to start on that for about two weeks most likely, but the last time I was working on it, I was doing pretty well, so maybe the loss of two weeks won't matter. There were times when I thought it would be okay to only have my permit and be comfortable driving, but I probably just need to go ahead and get my license.

I also need to finish transcribing my mission journal. I am not going to go back and recreate what I already did, because I still hope that some day data can be recovered off the hard disk. Maybe the point isn't so much to have it as just to have written it. Anyway, I'm going to do it.

Finally, there is that focus on health, and meeting my physical needs, which is so much a part of the self-care.

As I think about the stress, I keep wanting to go for walks outside and meditate, and then not leaving myself the time. That needs to change. I have been getting in short meditation sessions for the last few days, but my walks have all been kind of accidental, like missing a bus and just walking to the train. I would like to be more deliberate. Mindful, if you will.

I have this notebook for the caregivers program that is a 6-week program, so if I go through that, and work on the journal and practice driving over the next six weeks, then I feel like something else will come clear. I will know what to do, or something will happen. This has always been based on feelings anyway. (Feelings that read a lot.)

Anyway, that's what I'm going to be working on. If something interesting happens along the way I may write sooner, but I'll write on August 15th with an update for sure.

One more thing about the concert (I did miss a bus that night): the last song was "Ten Minutes". It repeats several times "Everything will work out". It doesn't mean that in the context of the song, because he is asking how she can say that, but that night, after an emotional roller coaster, I took it that way, and I still am.

Besides, he says she is always right in the song too. Sure, I think he means that she always acts like she is right, but the failure of the boyfriend to see the girlfriend's rightness should not necessarily be accepted at face value.