Still...Forget It

I didn't succeed in my stillness project.  The thing...you see... was that I was going to be still and come to realizations and revelations that I needed to come to.  I would calm my soul and the sea would cry out and I'd mermaid fantasy my way into reality and ride my fantasy rainbow to a pot of gold and live happily ever after.  Big NOT.  My life is steeped in denial.  Not as deeply steeped as before but, still stewing in it's own juice. 

I looked for answers to my lifes issues that were right there in front of me.  I was trying to be still when it was time for me to move.

I realize now that I was not able to be still because I needed to move out of the position that I was in, circumstances if you will and into other circumstances.  I needed to leave a job, I needed to change my diet and I needed some downtime to take care of myself and realize that wether I'm still or not that time just moves on.  Sometimes, it's necessary to be still and sometimes it's necessary to move.  And so I moved...albeit willingly but reluctantly.

I left a job that I was being held hostage in, I'm working on the diet change (it's difficult), and I'm starting to feel better about the fact that I have to take care of myself.  I'm blogging too...I slowed down or stopped for a minute there.

So, I awaken this morning  to a gray sky.  And sleeping children-an adult girl and a boy child.  I'm not ready to rock and roll yet.  I'm trying to blog.

I have many questions in my mind about many things.  Yesterday, my son went to a birthday party at the Bosnian peoples house.  I reluctantly sent him and he was real excited and enthused about going.  He put on his orange plaid shirt and black fedora and decided that he was going to wear it, regardless of how much cat hair adhered to it..  I was kind of distraught about the fedora but I let him wear it anyway.

A long lost friend that I haven't talked to for twelve years.  A long lost boy friend..or would be...or possible boy friend  that resurfaces.  A returning adult child.  And missed trips to Martha's  Vineyard.  Man do things pile up if you don't clean out your closet periodically.

Peaceful...I'll settle for that.

Damn Those Coffee Gods!

I haven't had any coffee today.  I want some...but the consequences of drinking that stuff are dire...even decaf has it's adverse side effects.  One thing I like about coffee though is the smell...or as they put it on the Maxwell House coffee commercials years ago...the aroma.   I bet if I went to a cafe and just sat there the whole day and sniffed coffee scent I'd be just as happy as if I drank it....NOT.

Coffee makes my stomach burn and I have to take massive doses of ranitidine to keep it from really paining me...not only that I have a stricture in my throat and have to go to the stomach doctor every so often to have it dilitated or dilated or however you want to say it.  Either way, this is probably a result of guzzling massive doses of coffee every day since I was sixteen years old and couldn't seem to motivate myself to get out of bed except for the fact that coffee existed on earth and the coffee gods would beckon me patronize the coffee pot each morning...until I was a basking in a hyperactive euphoria.  Back then I wished coffee cups were bottomless... some days for me they were.

I would walk into the cafeteria at the prep school that I attend..leaving a trail of hardened sleep peeled  from my eyes that I had failed to dislodge with the two minute water splash that  I mistook  for a wash up in the morning.  I couldn't see much through the slits that I called my eyes at that time of morning, but somehow I  feel my way to the coffee cups...grab one and get to the coffee spigot to fill my cup. To offset the bitterness of the coffee, I would add lots of cream and sugar...until I felt it was perfect.  Then I'd stagger to one of the cafeteria tables, look out of the window...(I like to sit near the window) and converse with the java gods until my cup was empty...Boy.  How I miss those days. (It was like meditating).

I sit here today...trying to avoid the coffee pot.  I have run out of coffee and coffee creamer..  When my son made a trip to the store last night I chose between coffee and ice cream...neither of which I should be consuming... in an effort to kick the coffee habit I chose ice cream.  I'm trying to stop consuming sugar because in the land of hyperness...it affects me worse than caffeine...but damn it I love sugar too.

But, that coffee pot beckons to me louder than ever. I can't wait til tomorrow, cause when I go shopping, I'm going to get a big bucket of decaf.  At least then, I'll have a choice as to wether or not I will drink coffee. Maybe...if those coffee gods don't tempt me too much, I'll limit myself to one cup or just two.

Still Trying The Still Project...

Okay, so this is supposed to be day 3 of my still thing.  And I am still messing up  I am logging my stillness or trying to log it in a journal.  But, I didn't journal yesterday.  I hit the ground running because I had not completed my work.  My work from work.  I'm very tired.  And I keep letting my boss talk me into working for her.  I want out.  I really do.  But I guess...not just yet.  I'm not exactly in angst anymore.  I was for a while. I was perplexed about life when I started this blog and what it had to offer or whether it had anything to offer.

I knew that I something to offer. But being pessimistic about life obliterates anything that a person has to offer. (I'm not sure that I even understand what I just said...but I will pick that sentence apart later).
What I'm trying to say is that if you expect life to give you anything without giving anything you won't get much.  Being a pessimist keeps you from giving because pessimism causes anger and resentment and bitterness and unforgiveness and you tend to hold onto things...

I'm not that interested in what the world has to offer anymore because what I found out ibs that you get what you give.  If you give beauty...that's what you get.  If you give ugly...that's what you get. Beauty and ugly avail themselves quite willingly.  It's a natural law of the universe. 

I've learned to enjoy giving without looking for rewards because  the reward lies in giving.  It's the most amazing thing.  But still...I am going to try to still myself for 30 days straight... Again.  I will start over today and see if I can tweak my stillness project to actually work for me.  I think that what I was looking for the first time around was something. I won't look for anything this time and see what comes. 

I'm a little scared this time because I'm not sure what will come and if I let go of my expectations willingly, that means that I'm giving up control of my stillness...which I don't really have control over in the first place.  But, the illusion of control is so strong that it is a part of me.  I have to let it go in order for this to work

STILL...

Still Trying 2

Hard.  That's the only word that I can use to describe trying to be still for 30 days.  The difficulty does not come from being still...it comes from trying to define what stillness is and being.  Humanity is so accustomed to moving around and trying to fulfill it's illusions of reality that we create a virtual world that is destined to crumble from our vivid imaginations of what we thing safety and security is. It is hard to be real...hard to be still.  It's hard to be real still.  I've been moving about like a pot of heated molecules.  I'm boiling.

What made the task of stillness even more daunting is being engaged by my children of whom all three are home.  I wanted to sit, journal, ignore and shush them, but I couldn't.  All extensions of  me (to a certain extent)  I see why I've drivien myself insane for the past 52 years,  I understand why they move around all of the time.  I couldn't shush besides they are a worthy and enjoyable distraction. .  My life has been steeped in vicariousness...which helped me to escape my own personal pain..  I owe my children....infinitely for saving my life.

I'm tired today.  I fell off the sugar wagon and ate browny and donuts.  I was tired before then but after I ate all of those sweet things, the fatigue has descended upon my like so many vultures on a decayed carcass.  It's eating me alive.  So, I need to get back on the wagon and continue my sugar free journey which will make my life much sweeter (only God creates paradoxed like that).

I'm becoming a lover.  A lover of God, life, people, myself and whatever I can gain the courage to face head on.  In the words of the late great Scott M. Peck, "Life is difficult" but in my own words, life is lovely. We have only to look through the fog of our virtual reality to see it.  But most of miss the lovliness, because we prefer fantastical lives and we are rarely if ever silent or still.

I'm going to try my stillness project again.  Starting over.  Today.