When I was probably around 14 or 15, I remember opening a Christmas gift from my grandma. Or maybe it was from my mother. Or probably, more realistically, it was a collaborative gift from the two of them, designed at a minimum to humiliate, and at its worst to force me into the terrifying realm of early adulthood. Read the rest of this gem…
“I wouldn’t say it’s the ‘winter of my life,'” he said with a smile. Read the rest of this gem…
I’m starting to realize that the act of making long-term plans over which I actually have very little control is kind of like watching for shooting stars through my sunroom skylights — Read the rest of this gem…
Look.
I wasn’t going to do that whole, let’s-get-drunk-on-over-analytical-self-indulgence-and-take-a-good-hard-look-at-the-innards-of-my-soul new year B.S. because ultimately it only leads to an incredibly low sense of self-worth. Read the rest of this gem…
I think I need help.
Not of the psychoanalytical variety, although that’s debatable, but of the prioritizational kind. Read the rest of this gem…
The eggnog’s been drunk, the gifts have been opened, and that week-long season — the one that somehow manages to suck entire months of our lives into its toothy vortex Read the rest of this gem…
While the movie, “How Do You Know?” required no less than 3 alcoholic beverages for me to get through it, I have to say — a couple of the lines were real gems.
Like, Never drink to feel better — Only drink to feel even better.
Good advice, no?
And, Don’t judge anybody else until you check yourself out. That way you’re lucky if it’s your fault because you can check the situation.
That’s so… zen.
And, I think I’m in love with somebody when I wear a condom with the other girls.
Never have truer words been spoken.
I even felt a certain kinship with Reese Witherspoon’s character, Lisa, when she was talking about how it seems like everybody’s “regular plan” is to fall in love, get married and have babies, but she’s not sure she’s cut out for everyone’s “regular plan.”
Umm… Domestiphobic much?
Seriously. There were so many profound thoughts and quotes stuffed into this movie, they could compile ’em to create volume 537 of Chicken Soup for the Existential Soul.
But it turned out there was one that worked its way out of the mass of banality to stick in my head like gum to a shoe and I can’t figure out why. At one point in the movie, Paul Rudd’s character George says,
I used to be a bartender, back when I was working my way through bartending.
At first I thought it was hilarious. I mean, what a clever way for him to describe a time in his life when he really was just doing what he was doing. There was no bigger plan. There was no ultimate goal. The plan was to make enough money to pay that month’s bills, and the goal was to go home with the most attractive woman in the bar that night.
That was it.
But as I thought about it more, it became… less funny.
Because I realized, if most of us were really honest with ourselves, we’d recognize that we’re doing the same thing. We’re fairly certain our lives are heading for something better, but until then, we’re just floating along, trying to get from one day to the next. Sure, we might have generic goals, like buy a house, find our dream career, start a family… and it’s awful because we’re so sure that once we achieve these goals, we’ll finally be satisfied.
George even says, “We’re all just one small adjustment away from making our lives work.”
Many people love that line.
I happen to hate it.
I mean, really George? I just need to make one little change — finally buy that throw pillow I’ve been eying? Pop out a couple of kids? Quit my job and move to Costa Rica? Tell me, what is that thing that will finally solve all my problems?
Quench my restlessness?
Satiate my unhappiness?
Because if I knew what it was, and I knew it would make everything roses and double rainbows for the rest of my life, I’d do it without hesitation.
But that’s the problem with this type of mentality. If I’m constantly making these adjustments and waiting for the next thing to happen with the expectation that I’ll finally reach this ultimate level of satisfaction, I’m probably going to be waiting forever. My life will be spent like the greyhound chasing the fake rabbit ’round and ’round the track — thinking, if I could just catch it, my life would be complete.
The fact I have to grasp is that I won’t catch it. And soon I’ll be too old to chase it. And even if I did catch it, I’m pretty sure it wouldn’t taste how I expected.
Contrary to how it might read, this isn’t intended to be pessimistic. It’s meant to be a revelation, of sorts, on my part. A way for me to say to myself, It’s okay that I’m going to work in a bar tonight. It’s okay that I still haven’t sent any pitches to any editors. It’s okay that I’ve been writing this blog for over a year now and WordPress still hasn’t Freshly Pressed me.
Ahem.
As cliché as it is, I need to start finding joy in my every day, because they’re passing by at an alarming pace. I can still make daily goals and work on things I want to accomplish, but no more thinking, “If only I had this, then I’d be happy.”
It doesn’t work that way.
I just need to be.
And the happy will come.
So I just finished my workout with Jillian for today, and I’m writing this post while still sitting in a puddle of my own sweat because I’m suddenly, inexplicably motivated. And these days motivation seems hard to come by, so I grab it when I can.
You know how it is when life just doesn’t seem to be going the direction you want, so you find yourself in a bit of a slump, and it gets harder and harder to pull yourself out of the slump over time? To use an over-used analogy, it’s like quicksand. The harder you struggle, the deeper you get, and eventually you just want to give up. Lethargy becomes second nature. Even the idea of picking a recipe for dinner and going to the grocery store for the ingredients seems like too much work, because didn’t I just do that two days ago? And what’s the point if it’s just going to be the same thing, day after day?
If you’ve never known that feeling, then I envy you. Truly. But if you have, I’m here to tell you that you can’t let it hold you down. In fact, all you can do is keep struggling against the quicksand, and eventually you’ll see progress.*
*Actually that’s not true – if you’re literally stuck in quicksand, I’ve heard you shouldn’t struggle because you will get pulled under. So wow… what a f*cked up analogy.
For the time-being, I’m doing little things that have started improving my opinion of my own self-worth.
1. This blog. Sure, it’s mostly just a bunch of introspective rambling and random recipes and an overall log of some (but definitely not all) of my most notable life experiences, but it’s my blog. It’s my thing that I do when I need an outlet. Some people journal, some people play guitar, some people paint. I blog.
Photo source: Me
2. Found a job. Okay, so waiting tables at a bar isn’t exactly the dream job I hoped I might find when I quit the cubicle all those months ago. But in a way, at least for right now, it fits my personality so much better. No one looks at me funny when I randomly start singing, because I’m just singing with the night’s performer and everyone else is doing the same thing. And I’m no longer getting strange looks for taking running leaps down the hallway or pretending I’m on an escalator behind someone’s cubicle glass, because I don’t have excess energy to expend at this job and therefore don’t act quite so entirely nutty. I’m always moving.
So while I still do aspire to do something more meaningful to me, this definitely works for now.
3. Working out. This isn’t a New Year’s resolution for me. In fact, you know my resolution is to be worthy of a holiday letter, so working out really has nothing to do with it. (Unless I end up saving someone’s life by lifting an SUV off of someone who’s crushed underneath it because I’ve been working out and am now obviously strong enough to walk around town lifting SUVs off of people. Now that would be letter-worthy.)
I’ve never been one of those people who gets a high from working out. In fact, it usually leaves me feeling sweaty and exhausted and there’s only one type of scenario I can think of that leaves me in the same condition and I feel really good afterwards instead of tired and disgusting. And working out with Jillian Michaels ain’t it.
But I do it because I know it’s good for me. Like flossing and not consuming a diet exclusively comprised of cheese. And today, after I was finished, I noticed an actual muscle!
And yes, I took a picture.
And yes, I’m about to show it to you.
So don’t laugh.
For me, this is BIG.
Woohoo! Maybe this is the workout high people are talking about – that point where you finally notice some progress.
So right now I’m feeling pretty good. I wrote a blog post, I grew a muscle, and I might make a little money tonight. Motivation is creeping back into my life. And I wanted you to know, even though my posts have been a bit emo as of late, that I’m not just sitting here, all pitiful and lethargic day after day. (Well I’m literally sitting here now, in a puddle of my own sweat, no less, but my point is that I’m not just a couch-drooling zombie.)
What I want to know is, what do you do to pull yourself out of it when you’re feeling a little slumpy?