Mondays

So research suggests that you're more likely to maintain a routine if you start it on a Monday.  Something about the start of the week and the start of a routine aligning is psychologically significant.

Right now, I think Mondays have too much pressure for me because of that.  It used to be that Thursdays were hard because it would be another 3 days until derby and I didn't really have much social involvement other than derby.  Weekends kind of sucked because I had all these expectations about what I should do with them that I failed to meet.

Mondays, it seems, have taken the place of Thursdays.  I wake up on Mondays and just want to avoid the world.  Avoid doing anything important or unimportant lest it become a routine.  I'm also terrified of starting something on a Monday because then if I don't follow through with it, I can't use the fact that I didn't start it on a Monday as an excuse.

So now I'm sitting here, writing this (possibly not even in my own voice because I've spent the past hour reading someone else's writing), and trying to figure out how to get out of a Monday funk.

Thoughts?  Suggestions?

Redefining Adulting

So there's this whole idea of "adulting" flittering about in our culture.  We're really proud when we do it but don't really want to a lot of the time and make fun of others when they're bad at it.

But...

I don't really know what it is.

It seems there are a lot of great things about being an adult and those don't really get characterized as "adulting."  We adult when we do dishes, go to bed early, have a calm conversation with someone who we think is an absolute ass.

Why is swinging on swings in the middle of the night looking at stars not adulting?  Why is choosing to stay up late knowing I'll be tired the next day not adulting?  Reading a favorite book? Eating my favorite foods?

I get to do most of those things because I'm an adult and I get to make choices.

Let's revolutionize adulting.  It's not doing what you don't want to do.  It's OWNING what you do.  Choosing to stay up late is adulting.  Choosing to eat sushi for a fifth day in a row, totally adulting.  Wearing clothes that make you feel awesome, going for coffee with a friend, skipping the gym today, all are things we do as adults.

A friend of mine said that adulting is wanting what's best for yourself and those you care about.  I think the cool thing about that is I actually get to choose what's best for myself as an adult and sometimes it totally is an oreo buffet and sometimes I get it wrong, but that's adulting too, owning the error.

My name is Whacks.  I stay up late.  I drink copious amounts of coffee and love donuts and dumplings and I'm an adult.

Old Habits Die Hard

This could be a post about smoking given the title, but actually it's not.

I recently started talking to this guy.   I've known him for a couple of years but we didn't really talk until recently.  As far as I can tell, he is nothing like a person I previously dated but now, truthfully, would be happy to never talk to again.  I hope, I really hope, that stays true.

Today we were discussing logistics of a trip we're planning.  I kept saying "whatever works for you" over and over again and finally had a moment where I asked him if he even wanted me to have an opinion because it seemed really really really hard for me to form one (which is odd, my derby name is apt, I can form an opinion on pretty much anything and then talk about ad nauseum).

This wasn't so much about that guy as about me and my past.

I spent so long being terrified of having the wrong opinion, of making a choice and then having someone I loved stomp all over it and use it to justify treating me like absolute shit.  I was too scared to actually be able to form an opinion today.  Nothing that's happened this far in talking to this guy should have made me feel that way yet I could not overcome the amount of fear I had to FORM an opinion, let alone express it.

I cried.

I thought I'd weeded all of this stuff out.  I've spent a fair amount of time trying to fix myself and find the person I was before I became the person I ended up being with my ex.  Yet just when life feels like it's settling into a rhythm, I find these old mine traps and patterns of being that I want nothing to do with.

My Complicated Relationship with Smoking

So I started to write a "book" once.  The opening line was "I smoke too much.  I eat too little and I consider myself an athlete."  Those statements were the most constant things I could identify in my sometimes tumultuous life.

Today, I quit smoking.  Smoking is something I've done for longer than I've been an adult.  Longer than I've lived on my own.  Longer than I could drive a car (legally).  I do not know how to operate in this world as a non-smoker BUT at times, I'm pretty excited to figure that out.

I am also, though, terrified.  I know it's going to be harder but I keep trying to remind myself that I've done things that are harder.  I've left two abusive relationships, have a second degree black belt, moved countries, and completed a PhD.  Quitting smoking shouldn't hold a candle to those things.

My relationship with smoking is more complicated though.  It's been a crutch, a way to meet people, a way to avoid people, a way to calm my mind, a way to celebrate or commiserate.  Last year, when I slept with wrist guards on and hid all the knives in my house, the one thing I kept repeating to myself was that I didn't want to die a smoker so I couldn't do what I was worried I'd do.  I guess you could say my relationship with quitting smoking has been complicated too.

I feel like this should all be much more celebratory than it is.  But if you're aiming to break a world record for push ups, you can't celebrate each one but you just have to dig in and push through.  I know that tomorrow will be harder than today and the next hour worse than now but beyond that I don't know what to expect and that scares me.  I feel like I'm ill prepared for the momentous yet I've been working towards this goal for the entire summer.

I want this to be no big deal but then I want to shout from the roof tops "Hey, I'm doing this thing that is a huge deal and identity shaking and comfort breaking and I need ALL the support I can possibly get even though I'll probably shrug it off when I get it"

I keep getting up to go for a smoke and then realizing I don't do that anymore.  I don't even know that I could make an analogy that works.  It'd be like trying to open the door with the wrong hand for the rest of your life.  Eventually you'll get to used to it but it's super annoying at first and you don't realize how much you opened doors until it became harder to do.

What if the next several days are me fixating on smoking and not being able to clear my head?

Post Playoff Depression

It seems like a lot of people experience a let down after tournaments or Playoffs (maybe similar to holiday blues?).  I know my entire life gets turned around for tournaments where I'm sleeping very little, socializing way more than I normally do and eating whatever some wonderful volunteer puts in front of me.

Derby is this weird thing where some of your best friends or people who really really really get you, you only see 3-5 times a year.  Everyone tries to make the most of it by basically not sleeping and fitting in all the zany things imaginable in a 72 hour time period all while watching great derby and desperately trying to find time to slip into the pool or hot tub.  It makes me feel like I want to be "on" for that entire time period and sometimes I start to think about how soon it's going to be over the same day it begins.

Right now I'm sitting on the fence about going to Champs.  My team didn't make it but I actually haven't missed a Championship since I got involved in derby (and was living in North America).  It seems like it'll be a bit bittersweet but I can't imagine not seeing all the folks I've seen the past two weekends until next year.

I get why people travel so much for derby.  They're travelling for the kinship too.

Failed Derby Goals

Note: This is an old post from when I failed to make the Belles' roster earlier this season and was on a different site.  It seems timely again though because the Belles' just failed to make Champs for the first time in 7 years.

Out-of-Your-Control Goals

So you didn’t meet your goal, passing a tryout, making a team, making a charter, etc. These sorts of goals aren't entirely within our control which makes it harder to figure out what went wrong and know what to do differently. It can leave you asking "What’s next?"

First and foremost, I want to say that it's shitty. It really is. Not meeting goals is hard, it can feel like abject failure. And different people react differently to this sort of thing. I, for one, have an urge to run far far far away and never engage with the topic again. This, I have discovered, is counter-productive. It doesn’t lead to me meeting goals in the future. The following is what I’ve found has helped.

One, be okay with your feelings.

You’re allowed to have moments where it just sucks. You’re allowed to be okaywith these feelings of suck-i-tude. Watch that funny TV show, take a bath, eat some cookie dough or talk to people you trust and get hugs. Whatever is going to allow you to acknowledge your feelings about it, internal or external validation.

Two, move on.

This is super important. You’re probably not going to get to place where you can work on meeting your goals until you’re in a better place. This can take minutes, days, weeks, whatever. But the following advice probably won’t help until you’re ready to think critically about it.

Three, assess the goal and your other goals.

Is this a goal that you have a lot of control over? I’m going to go out on a limb and say for the most part, no. It’s really easy to be frustrated not meeting goals when you don’t have the ability to meet them on your own (see all my experience of group work in school) and sometimes not meeting these goals can obscure your vision of all the other things you ARE doing and all the other goals you ARE meeting and have met. It’s way easier to focus on the negative than the positive and the one thing than the many. This is going to help you feel like you’ve regained some control of your situation. Make sure you have some goals that are under your control.

Four, assess your situation.

This is about how realistic your goals are. Are some people you trust and believe telling you that you can’t do what you want to or at least not in the time frame you’re thinking about? Are people bewildered that you’re not meeting your goal? This is all good external information about how to proceed. You probably need external information to figure out what's next because you had expected to meet a goal and didn't so now you're doubting your self-assessment. Ask for that information kindly and nicely and within the framework of moving forward from those you trust. You'll also probably get specific feedback about why you didn't meet your goal but more on that later.

Five, accept, accept, accept.

This is by far the hardest part but at this point, you’ve probably started constructing all sorts of stories about why you didn’t meet your out-of-your-control goal that are based on other people. You’ve got to get rid of them. They won’t let you meet your goal. The truth is, either your goal isn’t ascertainable right now because of you or you didn’t meet it because you didn’t meet. We do ourselves a disservice by constructing fairy tales and myths that make it so goals outside of our control are also goals where not meeting them is blameable solely on others. This isn’t to say if you did only one thing differently, you’d somehow make it but also to say that there’s some validity to not making it and there are things you can do to IMPROVE your chances, but not guarantee a result. Accepting that there is no panacea to meeting it, however, is necessary to do better next time.

Six, time to plan.

This is where your other goals come in. So I didn’t make a charter or a roster, what other goals do I have? To be a better teammate, better league mate, better derby player? To master a skill I’ve been working on? Guess what, all these goals will improve my chances of meeting my out-of-my-control goal AND all of these goals I can work on without having a perfect answer as to why I didn’t make it. So now, it’s time to figure out a plan to work on these things. Figure out where I’m falling short, figure out how far I’ve already come and dedicate myself to these causes and forget about that pesky failed goal for a bit. It’s time to build some successes and acknowledge progress. Also, it’s now time to figure out where the feedback you’ve received comes into play in terms of constructing personal goals but I’m going to leave how to assess feedback for another post because it isn’t as straightforward as we all seem to think.

A Clothing Based Analogy

I was trying to explain what being depressed is like long term and more specifically what sinking into depression is like.

Imagine you see a picture of you in an awesome shirt.  You realize you haven't seen that shirt in forever.  One day you think "hmm, I haven't worn that shirt in a while, maybe I'll wear it tomorrow."  The next day you go to pull it out of your closet and you don't see it there.  You think "odd, where did I put it? Oh well, I don't have time to look for it now, I'll find it later."  You can think of a couple of spots that your clothes often end up that isn't on a hanger in your closet so you're not too worried but you do wish you'd found your shirt that day.  A little while later, you start looking for your shirt.  You check a spot and it's not there, you start to worry.  You check another spot and it's not there, your worry increases.  You start thinking "did I throw it out?  Will I ever find it?  Did I actually own it before or did I borrow it from someone? Maybe it's gone forever."  You try on every other shirt you own  trying to recreate the picture you saw of you in an awesome shirt and how it made you feel.  You fail to do it.

The shirt is happiness, trying on every piece of clothing you own is everything that used to make you happy.

Depression sneaks up on you where one day you realize you haven't felt happy in awhile but you're pretty sure you have been happy in the past so you think "oh well, everyone has rough spots."  You start to realize that not only haven't you been happy lately, you don't even know how to find happiness anymore.  Eventually, you believe that you were only faking being happy before and actually you've never been happy in your life.  You worry and freak out about those facts and that makes it even worse.

I've discovered now that one of the key things I have to do when I'm feeling down is remember that I did in fact own that shirt and that I have owned other awesome pieces of clothing and even if I don't own any right now, I will definitely own some again because clothing ownership is cyclical (what? analogies aren't perfect although I do shop a lot at thrift stores so there still might be something to be said for this).

10 things that are seemingly common to the human condition

1. Dry skin (aka dandruff) -

Everyone gets it some time, some where (it's like the song from West Side Story really)

2. Nose picking 

Sometimes a Kleenex just doesn't do the trick

3. Wondering if you’re depressed or suicidal/ Seeing a therapist/trying medication

It's really hard to establish how your mental states compare to other people's mental states.  It seems that most people have wondered if how they're feeling warrants getting help at some point in their lives.

4. Wishing someone had told you more about what was going on

We've all had moments where we felt like we were left out of the loop.  Relatedly, we've all had moments where we've wished our friends would've shared more about what was going on with them.

5. Faking it ‘til you make it

Even the most self-confident people I know have, at times, bluffed their way through a sticky situation

6. Weird hair

Everyone seems to have at least one strand or patch of hair that disqualifies them from stereotypic beauty unless its removed.  Really, hair is just part of humanity so we should probably get over the desire for baldness.

7. Some weird infestation in your home

Every time I tell someone about some weird animal that cropped up in my house (bat, snake, mouse named "Lord Neville Fuzzbottom"), they have a "me too" story.  It doesn't matter how clean you keep your place, some animal is going to invade it so you might as well name them.

8.  Have conflicting wants

Humans are complex pieces of biology.  Sometimes you both want the cake and don't want the cake.  As long as you don't want to have your cake and eat it too, your head should be fine.

9. Failed to meet goals

Pobody's Nerfect.

10.  A cathartic enjoyment of zit popping

The number of videos and comments on said videos on YouTube has convinced me that this one is very true.

October 2014

What makes people say goodbye?

A life of missed connections

Or counterfactuals unfulfilled

A touch too far-

A slipped grasp-

A thought never put into words-

And a cup of tea gone cold

Waiting for the moment that never was.

I wish this had a happy ending…

But the fire’s burned

And no embers remain.

Dark skies come again

As God’s tears for the lonely hearted.

Those who couldn’t say

“I need help”

Those so cold.

Nobody’s gonna die today.

All lies.

My Community -Rough Draft

There are too many people in my community
who know the feeling of an unwanted touch
that gut wrenching, tear inducing, this can't be real, I-Just-Have-To-Find-My-Ruby-Red-Slippers-So-I-Can-Go-Home touch

There are too many people in my community
Who cannot name their pain nor lay its blame at the appropriate door

There are too many people in my community
Who cannot bear the label "victim" because it doesn't sit well with "strong" or "activist"

There are too many people in my community
Lost, Broken and Bruised by violence

There are too many people in my community
who hears hushed whispers of "assault" and "abuse"
and cannot, will not, do not yell "This shall not stand"

There are too many people in my community
Who perpetrate these crimes