Tuesday, January 1, 2019

Words

In March of last year, about 5 months after my major breakup, I decided that I was ready to start dating again.  I had gotten past my initial euphoria at leaving a bad relationship, allowed myself to grieve the good parts, and reached the point where I felt okay with being single.  I was ready.

As I was getting back into dating, I distinctly remember thinking about how good a mental space I was in.  I felt like I had worked through a lot of my old demons (anxiety, self doubt) and kind of figured things out.  I understood shit.  I can even remember, in one particularly arrogant moment, thinking that I had learned most of the big things in life and really didn't have that much more to learn.

(Cue deep laughter from the universe.)

In my last post of an unsuccessful NaBloPoMo, I wrote somewhat glibly about starting to meditate, completely diminishing the magnitude of the impact it has had on me.  On one level, it has done what I expected it to:  made me appreciate the present moment more, helped lower anxiety, and improved my always inconsistent sleep.  What I completely didn't expect was the deeper changes it has brought about*.

Through meditation, I am learning to see everything more clearly.  I am getting more comfortable with difficult things and learning to sit with them so that I can understand them better.  Habits, thought patterns, relationships.  The last half of this year feels like a veritable explosion of self understanding and personal change.  Far more has happened than I can possibly capture in a single New Year's post.

It became popular a few years ago to choose a word for the year as a way of setting an intention, and while I didn't do it at the beginning of 2018, in retrospect, my word for the year was clearly growth.

And what for 2019?  Mostly, I want to keep going on the path that I'm already on.  I want to remain in the present moment, enjoying it when I can and learning from it when I can't. 

2019 is going to be all about mindfulness.

*This whole post feels so hokey, and if I'd read someone else's version of it a year ago, I'm sure I would have rolled my eyes and accused the writer of having drunk the magical kombucha. 

18 comments:

  1. ❤️ I'm so glad for you. Happy new year!

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  2. Love this! May 2019 also be full of growth for you. Happy New Year!

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  3. Meditation definitely has it's benefits. So why can't I keep it up??? It is one of my goals to meditate 5 minutes daily again. I'll even take 5 minutes QOD. Happy New Year!

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    1. It's hard! It often doesn't feel good when you're sitting there, and it sometimes feels like you're accomplishing nothing, so it doesn't generate a nice positive feedback loop. I have to keep reminding myself that it is making a difference even though I have terrible monkey brain and often don't want to do it.

      A book that I found helpful was "Meditation for Fidgety Skeptics" by Dan Harris. He interviews a lot of people who meditates and addresses a lot of the challenges that people have with meditation.

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  4. I'm glad you're back! I think this is the year I try to meditate with some consistency. Let's talk.

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    1. I'm going to try to be back! I have thought often about blogging, but it's hard to do it when you get out of the habit.

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  5. I have only recently begun meditating daily, studying a little Eckhart Tolle and Pema Chodron It is beginning to work! I have thought about it in the past and approached it several times, but finally got serious. I have a dear old friend I reconnected with last June and she is about 25 or 30 years into it. She is also a psychologist and has been a real gift to me. It is nice to have some guidance and encouragement on this journey. Wish I would have started long ago, but this will have to do! Keep us posted!

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    1. I wish I had more people in my life who I could talk to about meditation, but I seem to be the only one in my group. I'm glad there's a space for me to talk about it on the internet.

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  6. Meditating for 10-15 minutes a day most days of the week is one of my goals for 2019. You've inspired me! :-)

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    1. I've gotten a lot of inspiration from others this year, so I'm glad I can pass some of it on.

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  7. So nice to see you post again, and can't wait to hear more!

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  8. I'm trying to get back into a meditation habit, too. It feels good when I do it, not sure why I fell out of it for so long.

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    1. You have a full life! I'm not surprised you find it challenging to find time to meditate.

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  9. Good! This is personal growth. Make it happen.

    Now... about this magical kombucha. Where is it and how do I get it in my life?

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