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A few things I’m loving about the Spring.

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As expected, life is feeling a little nutty since I’ve been back at work, and my days off have been spent trying to connect with friends, and take care of my personal life (you know the usual, laundry, cleaning the kitchen, going grocery shopping, menu planning, exercising… and a little bit of vegging)  But I did want to write a quick post about a few things I’m loving about the Spring.

Firstly, I love Spring in Oregon, because it is the season in which there is all of this hopeful change. The days are getting a little longer, and plants and flowers are budding all over the place, and we are starting to get a little break from the dreary Oregon winter. It just feels like the perfect time to be starting something new, and I feel like I’m bringing that energy with me to my new work environment.

I love that I can walk into the grocery stores right now and get bouquets of ranunculus, which are my all time favorite flower. I think they are so delicate and whimsical, and they come in an amazing array of colors. Right now I’m swooning over these peachy pink ones that are currently living in my bathroom, but last week I was tempted to buy about 7 bouquets of them! They have this deep purple ones that were super sexy, and this burgundy wine color that was amazing. I also picked up some yellow ones for a little pop of color in the kitchen… I’m so glad that I get joy out of the small things in life.

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Spring also means that color is slowly making its way back into people’s wardrobes (lets face it, it never left mine, even at times when it probably should have…. Don’t have anything that matches? Just add another color and walk out the door… seriously, most days I look like a very colorful yoga clown, but whatever.) I also feel like I can wear super bright nail polish and be seasonally appropriate… currently I’m rocking this Siren colored polish… but I can’t wait to get out the mint greens!

Please ignore the terrible manicure, and my gross dry dragon hands... my body is adjusting to life in a restaurant

Please ignore the terrible manicure, and my gross dry dragon hands… my body is adjusting to life in a restaurant

Also last week at Salt & Straw they had Lucky Charms ice cream to celebrate St. Patrick’s day…. Sweet Jesus, that stuff was good. Good enough to make it on my list of things that I’m slightly obsessed with/ loving this spring. I know it was a limited time flavor, and it is probably gone… (which is really too bad for all of you reading this now… cause it was pretty mind blowing).  But eating a scoop of it last Tuesday was quite possibly the highlight of my week.

 

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Magically Delicious

My yard is exploding with flowering things right now… I’m kinda on a time crunch, and it’s a little dreary out, so I don’t have any pictures to post, but the bleeding heart is emerging from the ground, hundreds of teeny tiny daffodils are starting to pop out, the fruit trees are budding, and I can’t wait to get outside and start planting my garden! Stay tuned for pictures and updates.

 

Here’s what bugs me: When my chocolate tries to tell me what to do…

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Just a quick post today about something that has been really irking me lately: The irritating little messages on the inside of the Dove chocolates foil… Anyone else? It’s February, so I’m sure there are a number of bowls of chocolate sitting around (or at least there were a lot of bowls of chocolate sitting around)… and I hope I’m not the only one who is annoyed by the current printing of wrapper quips.

Not to sound too nostalgic, but I remember the “good old days” when they actually said sweet, insightful things, or maybe had famous quotes on love, or things of note from famous people (I’m not making this up, right? ). I think the hay day for this was my freshman year of college (2003) because it seemed like you couldn’t through a dorm without seeing at least 5 doors that had smoothed out pieces of candy wrapper foil stuck to the message board, or all around the message board, giving passersby little anecdotes and insights about some empowering thing. (again maybe I am making this up, but didn’t they used to be kind of like be your own woman, buy yourself chocolate, you are worth it, sort of self-help mantras? ) There is a good chance that maybe they were always a little cheesy, and maybe it is just me that has changed… I have a much lower tolerance for cheese (metaphorically speaking… I love the dairy kind), and am arguably romantically jaded (it comes from 5 years of coordinating weddings).  but it seems to me as though the quality of the messages contained by these little wrappers has significantly gone downhill.

I used to unwrap a piece of chocolate with anticipation, wondering what little gem of a quote or nugget of inspiration would be there lingering underneath the bite of dark chocolate… and now, without fail, every time I read one of the wrappers it makes me want to punch that chocolate right in the face. I’m a twenty-seven- year-old single woman at home with my dog on a Thursday afternoon, and my chocolate is telling me to “savor small romantic moments”. Barf. Thanks chocolate, but I didn’t really need that, how about you make yourself useful and stop offering advice about what I should be doing/ thinking. Or why not just say something more generic like “savor small moments.” Still a little barfy, but at least it can be applied to anything in life. Playing fetch with the dog, observing the blooming flowers in the backyard, sleeping in, that extra cup of coffee… I’m more than happy to think about these small moments… and I do indeed savor them… Get a clue, chocolate… not all of us need to savor the romantic moments, and you might be alienating some of your target demographic (single ladies eat chocolate too.)  As a small disclaimer here, I am not a disgruntled single woman… I’m perfectly ok with my relationship status, and overall very fulfilled with my life… but I’m still irritated at the cheeseball sayings… You want me to buy more chocolate… Put Quotes from Arrested Development on the inside of a candy wrapper, and I would eat a bag a day… (it could actually be a really good thing these chocolates piss me off as much as they do…) They were so much better when they were more like fortune cookies, offering you encouragement and making you feel empowered.  Remember when they offered up messages like “believe in yourself” or “Make the most of everyday” Sure… still a little cheesy, but so much better than “remember your first crush” or “Share a secret.”  At least “Make the most of everyday” is a mantra that might at least be worthy of posting on your dorm room door or bathroom mirror… but “Share a secret”  awesome suggestion chocolate… Thanks for that, how about you sit tight and shut up instead?

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I know they are just stupid little chocolate wrappers, and the fact that I’ve written a ranting blog post about how irritated they make me probably wasn’t the best use of my time.  Furthermore, you would think that my self control would kick in and say “Tayler, you don’t have to read the annoying little message in the candy wrapper, just throw it away, you’ll save yourself some grief” but they are kind of like a train wreck… you pretty much have to read them! Every damn time I look at that dumb little saying, and every time my blood begins to boil just a little.  I know, I know, there are bigger problems in the world… there are bigger problems in my life… how pathetic is it that I allow a totally trivial thing like this to get under my skin? Perhaps I just need to stop eating chocolate… or at least invest in the kind that comes in little boxes, rather than the individually wrapped foils of cheese-bally doom. Or perhaps I just need to get a life, and get over it.

 

 

Jumping on the Coconut Oil Bandwagon:

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About a week ago I jumped on the coconut oil bandwagon. My roommate used to have coconut oil in the house all the time for cooking purposes, but for the past several years I have been all about the EVOO (extra virgin olive oil) and I use it in pretty much everything so I never gave much thought to other vegetable and nut oils. It was olive oil, or nothing. But it seems like everyone I know is posting things on pinterest about the benefits of coconut oil, or 101 uses for the stuff, and some of it actually sounds pretty interesting.

One of the great things about having more free time, is being able to follow up on whims and projects… I hopped in my car and headed to Trader Joes for a few random groceries, and of course some in-expensive coconut oil.

And here I am, a week later, kind of obsessed with the stuff… I’m using it in cooking, on my face, even for the dog. Here are a few of my top uses for coconut oil.

First and foremost, I purchased coconut oil so I could begin oil pulling. It is rooted in Ayurvedic tradition (something that fascinates me) and I had been wanting to try it for a long time. Essentially you swish vegetable oil in your mouth for 15-20 minutes, and it starts to stimulate the mucus membranes, and is a great way to detoxify the body.  I suffer from chronic tonsillitis, and every time I get sick, it manifests in my tonsils, so really anything that would help pull toxins from the body and give my tonsils a break sounded like something worth a try. Even if detoxification wasn’t in the mix, pulling is thought to help whiten teeth, improve gum health and help with bad breath. (who doesn’t want all of those things?) I’m an avid coffee drinker, and lately I’ve also been drinking a lot of green tea (supposedly as staining to your teeth as coffee) so whitening seems like an added bonus.  Supposedly, pulling also helps with migraines, skin ailments, joint pain, fatigue, and so and so forth.  The thing that makes the most sense to me, is that our mouths are filled with bacteria, and the mouth is the gateway to a lot of other systems in the body (plaque in the mouth is the same plaque that causes heart issues etc.) Starting to detoxify the body, even if it is just the mouth seems like it would naturally have a lot of health benefits… right? So I decided to try it, and I’m kind of obsessed.    You can use any type of vegetable oil, but when I tried using olive oil, I found it was too spicy, and was hard to keep the oil in my mouth for an extended period of time. ( I think sesame oil is also recommended, but also kind of gross). I like using coconut oil because the flavor is really mild. At first 15-20 minutes seemed like a REALLY long time, but being an infamous multi-tasker, I just decided to “pull” while I was in the shower and getting ready for the day, and the 15-20 minutes go by a lot faster than you think.  You don’t need very much oil (a very small spoonful, the coconut oil will melt in your mouth) and you do not want to swallow the oil as it will be loaded with bacteria.  After the time is up, spit the oil in the toilet or, as I do, into a  plastic cup.  (I suppose you could spit in the sink, but I used to work at an olive oil tasting room, and I’ve seen what excess olive oil can do a septic system… I’m inclined to think that coconut oil wouldn’t be that different… I plan on pouring my cup of coconut oil  out in some back corner of the yard…)   I’ve been pulling  for a week, and I’m still going strong. My mouth feels healthier, and I’ve noticed my tongue looks a lot cleaner… my skin is also looking great, but that could be the fact that I’m also putting coconut oil on my face.  Really, I want someone else that I know to try this, and then we can compare notes…

As a moisturizer:  I will admit, I was skeptical to start putting oil on my face. My entire life I’ve had combination skin, so I’ve been walking that fine line between excessively oily, excessively dry, or that weird shiny but flaky look that plagues us combination skin types.  Haven’t people been telling us our whole lives that its all the excess oil that is trapping the skin cells on our face and causing clogged pores? Well, after doing a little research, it made a lot of sense to me that trying to remove excess oil from your face with cleansers actually makes your body produce more oil, since your skin is trying to compensate. This leaves skin not only parched, but then saturated with extra oil… great… good to know I’ve just been exacerbating the problem for years.  I’m not a science minded lady, but it does makes sense to me that like dissolves like, so why we expect that washing our face with water would help get rid of oil is a mystery. But perhaps adding oil to oil… now we are getting somewhere… Putting “clean” oil on your face helps dissolve the “bad” oil and can help remove any build up in your pores… So not only have I started using coconut oil as a moisturizer, but I’ve also adopted the OCM (Oil Cleaning Method) and have started using oil to wash my face.

At first I was a little terrified… but when I saw how great my skin looked after the first “wash” I was sold… granted it has only been a week, and I reserve the right to change my mind at any time during this experiment, but for the time being, I’m sold. My skin has a healthy glow (and not the oily kind), and my pores appear way smaller… all I have to say to that is Halleluiah! I’ve always been a little self-conscious about my pores… ask me one thing I could change about my body, and I don’t even think about the cellulite or the shape of my thighs…(I mean I do a little, but when it comes to my body, I always figure if I REALLY wanted to make a change, I would work a little harder, exercise a little more… overall I’m happy with my shape…)  if I could change one thing about my body I would have smaller less visible pores… who knew that all it would take would be adding some oil to my skin? Currently I’m actually using a blend of caster oil and olive oil to “wash” my face, and am then finishing up by putting coconut oil around my eyes and on any dry areas. This post is getting a little long, so I won’t go into full detail, but I found the instructions on the Full Moxie, and she has some great explanations, and links to other blogs to get you started.  My only suggestion would be that, you should in fact use a hot wash-cloth over your face afterward to help open up the pores and remove the excess oil, otherwise it can be a little challenging/ a little messy to try and wash off in the sink. The only downside of this whole method is that I’m having to wash my hand towels more frequently (so maybe it’s actually a good thing).

     In food/cooking: I’ve only tried using coconut oil in a few culinary endeavors, but after reading about the health benefits, I’m excited to start using it more. Its supposed to be great for the Thyroid, good for boosting the metabolism, good for the immune system, good for your skin, good for reducing stress, good for your bones, etc. etc.  I’ve been adding a spoonful to my green smoothies in the morning, and it definitely enhances the flavor. Don’t get me wrong, I actually don’t mind the taste of green smoothies… but every now and then, they are just a little too green (I blame the raw kale) but the coconut oil adds a subtle flavor boost.  I also added a bit of coconut oil to my quinoa the other day (I usually make a large batch of quinoa at the beginning of the week, and then re-heat and enhance as necessary for a quick meal.) I usually re-heat the quinoa in a pan on the stove, so I tossed a little coconut oil in, and it was delicious.  I’ve also been using coconut oil to make popcorn… (its especially good if you are wanting a little bit of sweetness).

     For the Dog: Toby, like me, has rather sensitive skin… I used to put olive oil in his food to help with his skin and fur…  But, being a bit of an olive oil snob, it was getting a little pricey to be adding good olive oil to his food (he’s like my kid… but I don’t think he really appreciates the nuances of the flavor of the koroneki olive oil… and I’m on a tight budget) but over the past few days I have been mixing a little coconut oil in with his meals.   I’ve also been using coconut oil to soothe this dry nose, and have been putting a small amount into his nose rope. Those of you with bulldogs know that they are prone to yeast infections in their face rolls, and cleaning out his wrinkles is a daily grooming ritual. Coconut oil is supposed to have antimicrobial properties, and said to be good for treating yeast infections… (though I might just let the dog try that one out)  The coconut oil hasn’t completely alleviated his yeast problems, but it has definitely slowed down the growth rate, and over all his snout seems healthier and happier.

     On my hair: I’ve been growing out my hair for what seems like forever, and I’ve been doing occasional hot oil treatments to help stimulate my scalp and hair growth.  Yesterday I used coconut oil on my scalp and hair as a moisturizing treatment. Today my hair feels great, but I will say it looked a little greasy yesterday even after I washed it.  As a disclaimer, I have never been the kind of girl who can pull off shampooing every other day. I know it is supposed to be better for your hair, and I’m sure that if I actually toughed it out and got through the initial week of greasiness, I would really love the results… but I’m just not that girl. Its fine when I’m camping… but back here in the real world, I like to wash my hair…  I remember being a little girl sitting at the dinner table and my mom looking at me and suggesting that maybe I should wash my hair twice the next time I showered… she wasn’t trying to be mean, I know it was coming from a place of “I don’t want my kid to be the greasy un-bathed child on the playground” but I think it has lead to a life-long insecurity about having greasy hair.  (sorry mom, I don’t hold it against you) Not to mention the fact that pretty much every morning when I wake up, I look like the cross between Tarzan and a rat terrier. I shower every day… and I wash my hair everyday… call it my fatal flaw.  I’ve always been jealous of the women who could go for days without washing their hair (I have always had these types of women for roommates… and I’m full of envy). I’m getting a little off-topic I know… but what I’m getting at, is that the coconut oil left my hair looking a little greasier than I would have liked… but, I still think using it as a hair treatment is a great idea, but maybe I’ll just do it on the weekends.

Ok, this post is getting long, and I don’t want to bore you with my new found love of coconut oil. Just a quick list of a few of the other things I’ve been using it for

-to protect and moisturize my tattoo

-as a lip balm

-on my eczema patches (with mixed results)

-on my cuticles

Hello Hamstrings: a basic intro to Supta Padangusthasana

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I have really tight hamstrings… me and every other person in America (or so it seems). As a yoga teacher one of the things I hear about the most is tight hamstrings… which is why one of my favorite poses to do in class is Supta Padangusthasana ( or reclining big toe pose). If you have ever taken a class from me there is a very good chance this pose was visited… I do not preach in my classes (at least I don’t think I do) but I know I have told pretty much every one of my students that life would be better if we practiced this particular stretch in our daily lives.

Of course I have been saying this for years… and thus far I have never managed to get into a routine of doing this stretch at home… but I do teach it at least twice a week (if not more). But here I am, virtually unemployed, with a plethora of free time, and a lot of motivation, so I’m pledging to do this stretch every day for one week, and see if it actually makes a difference in my life. Who is with me? I’ll do a follow up post after a week of consistent stretching, and I’d love to have your comments & personal feedback (feel free to comment here or on the facebook page).

I’m not expecting any profound epiphanies, but I do know that since I have been running more this year, my hamstrings are even tighter than normal, and though this is certainly not the only good hamstring stretch (and maybe not even the absolute best one) it is by far my favorite.

There are a ton of other great benefits about this pose as well. It’s great for lower back pain, it stretches the calves and inner thighs, helps strengthen the core, it can help with sciatica, it can even help you reduce stress.  Denise Benitez says in an article for the Yoga Journal that “You may never become a model for the loose hamstring calendar, but the benefits of Supta Padangusthasana will enrich your life in many ways. Your pelvis will enjoy more of its full movement through space (great for Latin dancing!), all your yoga poses will benefit, and your spirit will be soothed by the gentle release of the often overworked muscles on the back side of your body.”

Do I really need to keep listing reasons why almost everyone would benefit from a daily dose of this pose?  Hamstrings can be tricky, and stretching them takes time (I’ve heard 20-30 minutes a day of un-loaded stretching) And we might not all have that kind of time to devote to opening these key muscles, but even two minutes a day is better than none.

This stretch is usually done with a  yoga strap, but if you are trying it at home a belt or long sleeved tee-shirt should do the trick.

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Bulldog is optional. =)  but he does add a little complexity to the pose when he starts nibbling on your ears/ face.

Start by lying on your back (supine) with knees bent. Place the strap (or whatever prop you are using) over the ball of the right foot and begin to extend the right leg up towards the sky. (keeping a slight bend in the knee is a-ok. First and foremost, listen to your body).  Starting out I’d recommend keeping the left knee bent with the foot on the floor, but if you are feeling a little more open, and don’t have any lower back considerations, you might want to extend the left leg out onto the floor, keeping a strong flex to both feet.

Trying to pull evenly through both sides of the strap, invite your shoulders to relax. (you might even anchor your elbows on the floor so you encourage the arms to relax). I like to engage my core while in this pose, by simply drawing my belly button in and up… offering support to the lower back.

You might gently let the right leg rock back and forth in this pose, getting a little bit of movement in the hip joint (because motion is lotion).

After spending at least 1 minute with the leg up towards the sky, transfer both sides of the strap/prop into the right hand. Invite you left hand to help anchor your left hip to the ground. (if you left knee is still bent, you can slightly let the knee open towards the left to act as a counter balance, which will help keep the hip rooted down). Very slowly, perhaps to the count of 10, invite your right leg open to the right side. Keeping the flex in the foot, you might even encourage the toes to inch a little bit in the direction of your right shoulder.  This is usually about the time I have to remind myself about what my core is doing, (keep zipping up!). Holding here for several breaths (or several minutes, you know your body best), then slowly begin to engage the secondary muscles in your right leg. Trying to use the strength of the leg rather than the pull on the strap to slowly (SLOWLY! Work through the resistance, you’ll gain more benefits if you help strengthen while you stretch! It’s not just about momentum!) lift your leg back up towards the sky. Hold here for a few more breaths before slowly releasing the strap, and lowering your leg.

Take a moment, and notice if you feel a difference between your right and left leg (right leg might feel just a little bit longer! Progress!).  As you are ready, bend both knees, and get ready to stretch out the left leg!

Helpful hints:

Try to stretch for the same amount of time on each side. How you track is up to you, you might just be able to “feel” when you are even. But you might count the breaths spent in each part of the pose, listen to a set amount of songs, or maybe even set a timer.

I love stretching in the morning, but you might try this stretch at the end of the day, and see if you notice a difference in flexibility from morning to evening. We tend to be a little more warmed up at the end of the day because we have been up and moving around a bit and your hamstrings might be a little less resistant.

You might also experiment with trying this stretch at the beginning/ end of a yoga practice, and see if you notice a difference. This stretch is a great way to warm up for a variety of standing poses, but it’s also a great way to end a practice after your muscles are already warm and have been working a little bit.

* I should probably put a disclaimer in here that yes, I am an RYT, but stretching/ exercising at home can have risks. PLEASE BE CAREFUL! For further and more detailed instructions, you might visit the Yoga Journal website

Clean Sheet Night: The most wonderful of wonderful things.

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Right now I’m celebrating the most wonderful of wonderful things: Clean sheet night. Of all the little pleasures in life, I think this one is by far my favorite… I love the clean linen smell, and the fresh crispness as you climb into bed… like your bed is giving you this fresh hug. All the corners are tucked in, the blankets are in the perfect place…everything is as it should be.

Yes, clean sheet night is the best… but getting to clean sheet night never goes as smoothly as I would hope. You’d think it would be simple. Strip the bed, wash the sheets, put them back on, go about your day, and anticipate that sweet sweet moment when you get to take off your socks, pants, clothes, whatever it is you take off before you crawl into bed. Somehow, in spite of my best efforts and intentions this is never how my sheet washing day unfolds.

Of course it doesn’t help that right now I only own one pair of sheets… (ok this is a lie, I own two… one extra special flannel pair, that are my all time favorite sheets, and have been since I was 16, and they are starting to get a little thread bare, so rather than put them into rotation, they live in my memory, and also under my bed… they are chartreuse flannel and have brightly colored snails on them… They. Are. Amazing… but they have not been put on my bed in years.) So rather than pulling the sheets off the bed & immediately remaking it, I am forced to wait the laundry cycle.

This usually happens on days when I’m getting a lot of things done and feeling really motivated. I’m making lists, I’m running errands, I’m cleaning things, I’m on a roll, and oh why not just wash the sheets real quick! This usually happens at some point during the day when there is sunlight streaming in my bedroom window, and it feels like the happiest place in the house and I have this moment of “oh you know what would be the best thing ever? If tonight was clean sheet night!” So I bundle everything up, put it in the washing machine, and them leave my room for the rest of the day and promptly forget about the next steps.

I’m not entirely sure how it is possible… I have great follow-through when it comes to a lot of things… but re-making my bed in a timely fashion is not one of them… Its like the sheets go in the washer and are immediately dismissed from my memory until that really unfortunate moment, usually really late at night when I finally decide I’m exhausted and need to crawl into bed in 30 seconds or less or something really bad will happen to my mind and or body, and I stumble back into the once sunshine filled room to discover a mound of pillows and blankets and things in disarray. Foiled, yet again.

Today was exactly that day. I had lists, I was motivated, there was sunshine, it was going to be an epic day. I walked the dog, put him to bed, gathered my glass of water and my laptop, and trudged off to the bedroom to tuck myself in for the night… I got to my room, big sigh, put down the computer and the water, and went out to the garage, where I had at least remembered to put the sheets into the dryer…

Back when I lived by myself, I had a few nights of utter weakness, when faced with the task of making the bed, or sleeping immediately, I took refuge on the couch. Normally I would not condone such behavior, (I mean I’m not that lazy!) but with the size of my old bedroom my bed had to be pushed up with one side entirely against a wall… which meant making the bed was actually a challenge. It always ended up being this awkward balancing body flailing thing where I had to lay my entire body out across the bed to try and tuck the sheets into the appropriate corners, and then do this sort of rolling maneuver to get my person out of the way of the sheet and where it needed to be… It was like a bed making obstacle course… and most nights I was up for the challenge… but there were a few late nights when I came home from work, and of course had forgotten the bed was unmade, and I would spend a few moments standing in the middle of the room with a look of disbelief and a posture of defeat, and then slump towards the living room dragging a blanket behind me.

Thankfully tonight isn’t one of those nights. I’m happily tucked in between the sheets, swishing my toes back and forth, relishing the fact that tonight is my favorite night. Tonight is clean sheet night.

Loneliness, late nights, letting go.

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I go through life sometimes writing out blog posts in my head… and let me tell you, they are perfect on the first draft, and everything I want to say… then by the time I actually sit down at my computer and try to type out sentences, it all gets lost, jumbled, becomes unclear… and as a writer this is really frustrating… what is in my head isn’t translating to the page… somehow it makes me feel like I’m failing at communicating…

Right now is one of those moments… I had this entire stream of consciousness blog drafted in my head about being a night owl, loneliness, starting over, forming new dreams, letting go… and I’m really struggling right now to get it onto the page… I guess I just have to keep typing and hope that some of the issues between my brain and the keyboard will work themselves out….

I guess it is my blog, and if I want to have random snippets  of thought pieced together I can…

Here is the thing about being unemployed… you get way less e-mails. In some ways this is very freeing… though if you are like me and totally addicted to your phone it makes the constant checking way less exciting…. What do you mean I only have 2 new e-mails and they are both from Pinterest?  But on the bright side, it is giving me real motivation to actually read the e-mails I subscribe to. I actually open the Writers Almanac when it is delivered, and yesterday rather than just immediately junking the daily e-mail from Yoga Journal, I actually opened it and read an entire article… yay free time.

Turns out the article was all about dealing with personal crisis and the steps for dealing with it and reaching spiritual maturity… which is kind of exactly what I needed to be reading (but really the title of the email was the Awakening… no way I would have normally opened it).

There is a section in the article called “Facing the void” and as I was reading I realized that my space of transition is still really centered on my failed relationship. You’d think I’d be more lost without the job I’ve had for the past five years, because so much of my identity was wrapped up with where I worked… and yet here I am, only a week out of the job, and I’m completely ready to let it go, to move on, to start a new chapter… and yet I was only in this relationship for a brief moment, and I cannot seem to get past it… which is really unfortunate since he has already moved on… and it’s not like I’m carrying this torch expecting him to come running back… I’m too much of a realist and a cynic when it comes to love… but its more like I’m scared to let go of the person that I was in that relationship… I’m scared of moving on.

Its so hard to admit that, and to process it, and to realize that its where I am… I mean at the end of the day its not like it was the best relationship… and I’m sure part of it is a fear of being hurt again, a fear of opening up, and a fear of starting over.

Being alone doesn’t scare me… I mean yes, loneliness is a daily battle for me… but its also something that I’m pretty used to… its not crippling or overwhelming… its just kind of like a dull ache, its there and you are aware of it, but you power through.  For me it is by far the worst first thing in the morning… I remember having a late night conversation with my ex about how much he hated coming home from work to an empty apartment…. I’m the opposite… I like coming home at the end of the day, settling into a routine, being able to curl up with a book, or mindless tv and just veg… I can turn my brain off, and drift off to the sounds of the snoring bulldog and something playing on Netflix… and then the morning rolls around, and I wake up, and its hits me… I’m waking up alone, starting the day alone, facing life alone. There is no one to say good morning, no first phone call, or text message, no one to share coffee with, no one to motivate you, no one to push you to be better… and eventually I suck it up, I get out of bed, I power through… but some days it is easier than others.  I think this is why over the past few weeks I’ve really reverted back to my night owl tendencies…  give me the late nights, and the warm bed, and the good book, and the bad tv… especially when there isn’t something concrete I have to do in the morning… I could go to bed early, and get up early… but when the night time is so comfortable, and the mornings are so hard, it just seems reasonable to stay up late, and put off the morning…

I don’t want it to sound like I have trouble getting out of bed, that I’m struggling with crippling depression or anything like that. I actually do get out of bed every day… I am productive every day, I’ve even been exercising everyday … but I am also lonely everyday…

I guess I’m bringing all of this up because for me, my job was a distraction from this… and now I have less to distract me… which is good… I’m realizing that this is a journey, and I probably have a lot of things I need to weed through, and emotions I need to deal with… I actually hate it that I’m more upset about losing a 2 month relationship than I am about losing a 5 year job… I’d like to think that the job impacted my identity way more than he did… that living away from the job will be harder than letting go of  the idea of him…ok not so much the idea of him, but the idea of us…

I’m actually starting to view losing my job as a good thing… I know that in the long run it was holding me back… it was safe and secure, and there isn’t anything wrong with wanting to feel safe and secure at your job, but it was also frustrating… and I know that there were times I let it hold me back. I was constantly thinking “I love my life, I love my job, I love where I live… I just wish I had someone to share all of that with”  and now without the constraints of the job, maybe I can find someone to build a life with, rather than trying to find someone who will fit into my existing life.

I’m quite sure this is the most challenging part of dating… I look at all my friends who met the people they are dating/ married to in college, and it makes so much sense, because rather than growing and maturing individually, you get to grow and mature together. You figure out what you want together, and you have the chance to cultivate your identity with another person, you make choices together, you shape your lives together…  I’ve shaped my life completely 100% on my own… I’ve made my own choices, I’ve followed my own passions, and I’ve spent the last several years really discovering who I am, and making choices that have shaped my identity. I’ve been able to be selfish, because you are allowed to be a little selfish when you are a single twenty-something… and so here I am, feeling like I’m finally comfortable in my own skin, like I know what I want, what my goals are, and who I am… but I got here on my own… and it feels really challenging to be able to let someone else into that… more-so it feels challenging to be able to take someone else’s goals and dreams and passions, and try to figure out a way to entangle them with mine…and it seems a little overwhelming to hope that I will be able to find a person with their own passions and talents, and goals and dreams, and somehow figure out a way to seamlessly mesh our two lives together without completely losing ourselves… actually it seems a little overwhelming, because I did have this… I had this exactly and I’m afraid at what my odds might be for finding it again…

And now I’m just rambling… I hoped that if I kept typing my thoughts would become less jumbled, but I think the opposite is starting to happen, so I’m going to quit while I’m ahead.

I’m going to get off the couch, do a little meditating, drink the rest of my green smoothie, and head into my afternoon. I’m going to be confident, I’m going to stand up straight, I’m going to interview for a job I think I could actually be really good at, and I’m going to have dinner with my girlfriends.  I’m going to take one moment at a time… and I’m going to work on me… cause at this point, what else do I have?

I laugh at what I cannot change

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“I laugh at what I cannot change” -Dave Matthews Band

 

The universe has a wicked sense of humor… thankfully I do as well.  It’s no secret I’ve spent the last few weeks (or better part of a month, whatever) doing a bit of wallowing… But there was starting to be light at the end of the tunnel, I was getting motivated, being less sad, less lonely ( well ok that it’s a blatant lie, but I’m trying to fake it) more motivated, and planning for my future.  My main plan for getting past my breakup was going to be to throw myself 115% into my job, start planning new projects, re-organize a lot of things, open up lines of communication, and overall have a rockstar year.  This wasn’t just plan A this was THE plan, the only plan… my glimpse of sanity was wrapped up almost entirely in this shiny beacon called going back to work.

So when I was let go this week rather unexpectedly, really all I could do was laugh. (ok, I also cried, but there was a bit of laughter as well). This is why you should always have a plan B. Remarkably I’m actually doing ok… yes, I’ve had overwhelming moments of sheer terror… Of course my car is way overdue for being serviced, of course my roommate is moving out at the end of the month, and let’s face it, I was stressed about my finances before all this happened… but I’m still trying to approach the situation with a sense of optimism… And I guess for now I will fake it until I make it.

Naturally I’ve had about a zillion hind-sight moments, what I could have done better at my job, what I could have done different in my relationship, what I shouldn’t have spent money on over the last few months… but that’s the thing about hindsight, it doesn’t really get you anywhere ,except for feeling shitty about yourself and the choices you have made. So I’m choosing to look forward, hopefully will learn from my mistakes… and embracing all of my past frivolous purchases, and looking forward to some extreme budgeting… (hey, at least I will look good as I fumble my way through unemployment… and there is something to be said for dressing for success).

About a million years ago, the guy I was dating broke up with me, and as he did he offered me this advice “don’t think about the what ifs, but think about what’s next” At the time, I thought it was pretty much a douche bag thing to say… (and let’s face it, when its coming from a 25 year old guy, it IS a douche bag thing) But now, 4+ years later, I’m kind of clinging to it as my new mantra… Because living in the past is easy… seeing your mistakes, wanting to re-live things, all the good and bad memories… its familiar, and easy… and totally delusional, but  it can be comforting none-the-less. Especially since I’m realizing that a HUGE part of my identity was wrapped up in my job… I worked there for almost 5 years… and essentially became an adult at that place… and for the past several years I know that there is a good chance that I was somewhat stuck there… It was so much of who I was, that I was scared about what would happen if I left, and I often found myself saying “I love my job, I love where I live, I love my life… but I just wish I had someone to share all of that with”… And the truth of the matter is that when you are married to your job, and your job is at a lavender farm it’s not the best place to meet someone. (though I did actually meet someone at work… and it kinda sorta changed my life… but that is all a mute point now).  Essentially, I’m realizing that it IS time for a change, it is time to get out of this comfort zone that I’ve built around myself, and it is time to start moving on… which isn’t always easy.

 

So here I am, throwing myself into the great unknown… telling myself to embrace the change… and it’s not even a little bit comfortable… but it also isn’t as terrifying as I thought it would be.

My gradschool application was turned in on time… I’m fairly certain my landlords (who also happen to be my parents) will not evict me if I cannot find a roommate right away/ temporarily slack on rent (they probably won’t let me go hungry either, right?  Not that I have plans to take advantage of my family mind you) I’ve got connections, and some amazing friends… and in the moments when it all starts to feel a little overwhelming, I have the worlds snuggliest bulldog. He’s a little smelly, and it snores louder than any boyfriend I’ve ever had, but he pretty much loves me unconditionally, so I’ve got that going for me…

 

Toby-Tobe