2011 was a doozy for most and I am no exception. At the start of the year, I felt like I was going to lose my mind, stressed out to the max about whether we should stay in Ithaca or move back to La Jolla. Mid-game changes are not my forte. The Professor seems to thrive on them. After much struggling, we came back to southern California last July and have been trying to settle back in to an old place with a new attitude.
The problem is I haven’t found the right set of new tools. It’s very challenging to reinvent your lifestyle when you have the same old approach to doing things. It’s like my wine habit. Reading in a magazine how I can replace the wine with herbal tea or a bath in the evenings as a wind down method doesn’t help me. I have my own style and I’m not really interested in boiling a kettle of water or filling up a tub when it’s 5:00pm and I want to uncork something to go with my dinner. I am motivated to change in bigger ways.
The problem is I haven’t found the right set of new tools. It’s very challenging to reinvent your lifestyle when you have the same old approach to doing things. It’s like my wine habit. Reading in a magazine how I can replace the wine with herbal tea or a bath in the evenings as a wind down method doesn’t help me. I have my own style and I’m not really interested in boiling a kettle of water or filling up a tub when it’s 5:00pm and I want to uncork something to go with my dinner. I am motivated to change in bigger ways.
We are trying out new roles as teacher and writer instead of CEO and volunteer/housewife. In order to make it work, we have to adjust the spending of our energy, time and money. My habits are deeply ingrained and I find it difficult to stop behaving the way I used to. Last month I mindlessly bought a pair of $200 grey suede clogs (online because I gave up the mall), wore them around the house for 15 minutes, then got a hold of myself, put them back in their box and printed out the return label faster than I could say, “Please credit my account.” After 20 years of making and spending money as a way to survive, I find myself slipping left and right as I try to reduce expenses and keep myself on the word document in front of me. I end up jumping over to Firefox to shop, chat or spy, or worse, jumping out of my chair and heading out the door to waste energy, time and money on the avenues of La Jolla.
My best friend reminded me that change is not a perfect upward curve on a growth chart, but rather jagged, with ups and downs, set backs and if you’re lucky, big leaps forward. I am going to keep at it, every which way but hopefully not loose...Here’s to making 2012 the best leap year ever!
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