Mindful Monday: Personal Presence and Dealing with Feelings

I took a break. A long break from posting. I was faithfully posting every Monday through March. 

Then it was April. There are four months of the year where I am insanely busy: January, April, July and October. It corresponds with the time when the catalogs roll-over and my customers get a brand new fresh catalog. In that catalog are all the changes that will be in place for the following three months. It's my job to discover what is new and what has changed so that my customers get all the savings to which they are entitled. It takes a toll on my energy. Today starts a new quarter. I'm rested but still feel anxious about what I cannot control. Which is stupid, really. I acknowledge it and intend to watch out for the anxious feelings arising. I have your name Anxiety. You will be named. I am acknowledging feelings in the moment.

So during April, I was teaching Meditation on Fridays; a requirement for one of the three programs I was enrolled in. Two programs finished this quarter and I became a Certified Mindfulness Facilitator and a Certified Teacher through Psychic Horizons in Boulder.  Taking three classes simultaneously, working full-time and COVID-19 quarantine wiped me out. And, as a founding member of Overachievers Anonymous, I published my book on May 4th. Get Grounded in Chaos: www.amazon.com/dp/B087THQS73

I was teetering on burn-out, Zoom-fatigue, and low energy. I'm in the high-risk group for complications so I had my doctor write me a letter to get out of the gym membership.  They wouldn't cancel it. So now I have to get another letter. So burn-out, exhaustion, and on-camera fatigue. There was a peer group meeting where I could not be on the camera. I did not want to show my face. I did not want to be live because I was in a bad mood, a really bad mood. Well, that was taken with offense because the presenter, who stopped in the middle of the presentation to call me out because she "wasn't used to speaking to a black square." Yeah, well tough. I had to do what felt right for me.  Have you experienced zoom bullies?? If I don't feel like showering or washing my hair, why in the world would I go on zoom? I leaned into how I was feeling and did what was right for me.

I took two weeks off. Memorial Day week and July 4th week. Off. No work. No personal work and definitely no work for my day job. Over Memorial Day, I did a three-day retreat of meditation. #-days with nothing to do but walk the dog and meditate-- and I began to feel better. Not back to writing-better, but better. 

Last week, I did all my honey-do's because I am my honey and no one else was going to do it. But it was FUN! I like mowing. I like mulching, and weed-whacking. I like watercolor painting. I have two headboards that came with the house. I painted them pink (because I already had the paint), so that when my niece and nephew arrive for a visit, they will have a real bed, with real furniture. I bought and assembled the bedframe. Then the beds arrived, and with delight when I laid down on the mattress, I realized that I bought the wrong type of bedframe. No Bueno.  Feet in the air, butt on mattress on the floor. And I laughed and laughed.

I started a watercolor painting of lavender fields with this lovely British teacher on Udemy. What fun. What glorious great fun.  I let my masking solution turn to rubber and I had to try again. But I had FUN.

And suddenly, after months of ordering delivery of groceries and not going anywhere, I felt a bit of serenity. I named my house. The Castle. Completed with a moat (ok, pool). And I am the Queen of this castle and I feel pretty darn good. I have a nice place to wait out the COVID.

So even though it is July and the crush of the next eight weeks of work in on, I am happy in my castle. I pause and am grateful for this moment in time, for this time to be alive, that I am healthy, and I have a castle. 

Oh, and I'm back to writing. I acknowledge that the one thing I use to gauge my feelings is whether I am writing. And I'm back to writing-better.

Next up: The 10-day Gratitude Challenge.