Do you know how you know when
you are really stressed? You can’t
remember anything; you walk in a room and forget why you walked there in the
first place? You cannot seem to focus on
even the most mundane jobs and then you beat yourself up for being so
stupid? Does this sound familiar?
This is all too familiar for
me. Stress can sneak up on you too. I think I am being super productive, working
so hard, doing all the right things. I
push myself to do one more task, got to get that “to do” list done before I can
rest. I often say to myself, if only I
had more time, (or you might say more
money, the right job, car, clothes etc.…) I might then get everything done that
I need. I might then have peace and
happiness. But instead I find myself with signs and symptoms of ADHD, (or at my
age is it Alzheimer’s?!) My productivity
slows down to a dribble…this is when even the simplest problems and decisions
can seem so overwhelming and I cannot see the simplest solution right under my nose. It is also when the little roadblocks also
seem like mountains.
Case in point, I’ve been
trying to clean out my office and especially my office desk for an eternity,
guests are coming so the Ego says this is eminent. To add insult to injury, the days are
becoming shorter and although I have a sunroom for an office the lighting sucks
and when the sun goes down so does my eyesight.
I even splurged and had my husband buy me two new office lamps for me
for Christmas which came yesterday to solve “THE Problem” but last night as I
tried to assemble them so I could see start cleaning the office out (of course
it was close to midnight….) I discover they came
broken…..ARRRRRRGGGGGGHHHHHHH! Father
time is clicking and I’ve convinced myself there is not enough time, money etc.…. It is also this week that my old office
furniture decides it has had enough of my abuse. The pretty looking file cabinets decide to
collapse under the mountains of paper that I try to stuff into them, the
handles come off my desk cabinets (because I’ve stuffed them too full, the
bottom falls out of the big center desk…. You get the picture. I get
the message that it is past time to purge.
To let go of the old so I can bring in the new. I’ve detoxed my body, lost the last 15 pounds
to obtain my ideal weight but now need to clean the clutter in my office and my
mind. Like my nutritional coaching, I
have to be kind and gentle to myself, listen to the messages that are being
delivered to me. STOP, LOOK and LISTEN.
I need to stop the negative
mantras or ANTs in the head. Deepak
Chopra says that if you think there is not enough time, that is the surest,
fastest way to high blood pressure, a heart attack and stress related illness
and you will indeed succeed at your self imposed self fulfilling prophesy. So I have to admit it, so it is with money
too, or weight loss or finding that dream job or whatever goal it is that you
are seeking. You will only obtain that
which you feel worthy of and the only way to self worth is to look at and
accept both the light and the dark sides of ourselves clearly and kindly
without harsh judgments. To honestly look at what is holding us back. We
must look at our fears and have the courage to move forward in spite of
them. This is why I have my own coach,
my own sponsor and my own beautiful support groups.
So my only option last night
was to stop and go to bed. This morning
when I woke up I took the time to journal (a beautiful and necessary gift from
me to myself). I wrote my to do list and
then returned to my dark office to begin the process of cleaning off the
desk. I then noticed that one of the
bulbs in the desk lamp is burned out and the other environmentally better bulb,
(that was supposed to last 100’s of years without changing) had gradually
slowly over time, lost almost all of its lumens.
Isn’t this how chronic illness, anxiety and emotional
discomfort develop? Slowly over time,
barely noticeable until some message hits us, we wake up and realize we cannot
continue doing things the same way?
I went into the kitchen to
find a new light bulb (forgetting why I walked in there when I saw the mess I’d
made there the night before) finally found a new bulb and replaced it.
VOILA! What a difference the new light bulb made on
illuminating my desk! I can now begin
the process, one step at a time and it really wasn’t all that difficult or
expensive to fix. How often do we create and or amplify our problems by not
taking time or the steps to care for ourselves first? How often do we ignore self care until it
comes up to bite us (yes Lisa, this means organizational and financial health
too) How often do we let our perceived stress control us instead of us
controlling our time, money and attitudes?
It’s our successes that
enable us to more freely move forward.
Recognize the small successes; celebrate the progress and the
journey. Maybe we can even laugh at our
own humanness. As my daughter Dana says,
“Practice not perfection”. Being mindful
of what we want to bring into our lives.
Replace the fear with light and hope, self love and forgiveness.
Today, I am not only going to
just clean off the desk, I am going to purge that which I no longer need.
Can anyone tell me how to
dispose of this “environmentally safer” mercury bulb?
Food for thought; I would
love your comments.
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