Thoughts on Impulses

I can't believe that it's been a month since I last posted here.  Apologies to anyone who actually follows my blog.  I've been struggling with different impulses over the last month.  When I last wrote I had figured out that I wanted to go into I/O Psychology, and that is still something that I want to do.  But then I hit a snag with my pursuit of that path; namely, that I'm not sure if I/O Psych is the only discipline that could lead me into consulting and career coaching.  I decided to do a little research and networking and figure out if I/O Psych was the only way or if there are other paths that might be more suitable for me. 

Next thing I know, I got completely distracted trying to fix my work schedule and trying to use up some Groupons that were about to expire.  Way to go, Procrastinator Me at her best.  Turns out, I still haven't used the Groupons and when I finally got my October schedule figured out, my November schedule came out and now I have that to fix.  In the meantime, I started thinking of all the things that still itch me to get into.  You know, the things that aren't practical, but are so very tempting to me: writing and photography.

I was daydreaming about them mostly, but when my sister saw one of my photos blown up on a gallery wrapped canvas and asked me why I wasn't making a business out of it, I didn't really have a good answer except to admit that I was scared that I don't even know where to start doing that and mostly I was afraid that I would fail.  There are so many great photographers out there who have taken classes and own fancy cameras; how can I even pretend to compete with them?

A few days later, speaking with a friend's sister who is an artist got me thinking about a short story that I never finished writing.  If I just sat down and pushed through and finished it, she could do some awesome illustrations for it.  And then I had an idea for another story that could probably grow into a novel.  Just a few days after that I found out that tomorrow marks the beginning of NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month) and decided to just jump into the deep end of the pool, head first, and take part in the challenge to write a 50,000 word novel entirely during the month of November.  Thankfully, it'll only be a rough draft, but even that will be a challenge to complete while flying and doing all the Thanksgiving rounds.  I'm definitely nervous and wondering if I'm way over my head, but I've never written a novel before, always wanted to, and if all the other people that do this every November can write 50,000 words, why can't I? 

So, now, thanks to my impulses, I'm writing a novel in November, trying to take dance classes to use up my Groupon in December, and at some point I'm signed up to do a 34-week virtual retreat.  This doesn't even include the task of figuring out how to market my photography, trying to take a photography class, working on my career research (that for the moment is on pause), or finishing up the children's story that I mentioned earlier in this post. 

About those impulses, my biggest two qualms are that I could fail and that they could just be distractions.  Tackling failure for just a moment, it is probably our biggest fear in any task we take on in life.  Think about how parents fear that they will fail to raise their children the right way, or the way that some people never seem to open a cookbook and turn on the stove for fear that they will fail and their meal will taste terrible.  The fear of failure stares us in the face from every direction we turn towards.  But, you can't gain anything without risking something, and no matter what else you risk, failure is always part of that.  You can't gain anything without possibly failing, and we learn from our failures, which means that the more failures we have, the more chances of gaining something we have had and the more chances to succeed thanks to the lessons we've learned we will have.

On the topic of distraction, I'm really not sure whether all of these impulses that come up and take over my attention are just distractions from my original purpose, or subconscious reminders that there are other things that, no matter how impractical, I really want to explore and pursue.  When I realized that I'd put the serious career project on hold for my writing and photography impulses, I felt guilty.  I felt like I had no follow through.  As I pondered the situation further, I realized that writing and photography have always been a part of who I am and probably will always be part of who I am.  They are ingrained in my genetic code and flow through my body like the blood through my veins.  Even when I came upon psychology as a possible career path, I was excited thinking that taking some psychology classes could also help me build better characters in my writing.  This all leads me to think that, as impractical as writing and photography are to pursue as careers, maybe they do lie in my personal career path after all. 

So, here I am, taking a break from what I will call the "serious" career project and launching on what I think is a necessary pursuit of my writing and photography.  If I never give them a serious chance, I will regret it and I don't believe in living with regrets.

What do you think?  Is there something that everyone has always told you can only be a hobby that you really have an urge to pursue more seriously?  Have you made a career out of something impractical or unusual?  If so, please share a comment.

Future Pictures and Revelations

I've been working since my last post to write a post about the new book that I am reading, Jason Ryan Dorsey's "My Reality Check Bounced."  I was getting caught up in trying to convey all my "aha! moments" instead of the result of those moments.  I've decided to try and change it up a bit; after all, you can always read the book yourself and find your own "aha! moments."

The book begins as a sort of pep talk.  You CAN have the life you want and you CAN build a career on your own terms, but in order to do that you must take action TODAY.  This is the same sort of thing that Ramit Sethi is talking about in his post about testing assumptions.

But, how do I begin?  I was asking this of myself as I continued to read.  The secret lies in formulating a very detailed and specific vision for your future.  Mr. Dorsey calls it a "future picture."  The author then provides an exercise in which you answer questions relating to your ideal career, family life, personal life, and life's meaning.  By answering questions like "what shoes will you wear to work?" and "what will be your main responsibility [at work]?" you start to form your "future picture."  Once you have a vision for all four areas of your life, you can pinpoint which areas are most important and how they all connect and your "future picture" becomes even clearer.

I determined that I want to wear cute shoes to work.  I want to pick out my shoes without restrictions on color or style and I want to be able to wear a skirt and heels without worrying about whether or not I'll be able to bend down to reach through a cart without showing too much of myself to passengers all around me or worrying that the second I get to work my pantyhose will inevitably get caught on something and run.    This was perhaps the answer that surprised me the most because I don't consider myself to be a girlie girl.  I enjoy being a girl, but I don't wear makeup every day and sometimes I'm just too lazy to blow-dry my hair, so who would have imagined that I'd miss wearing skirts and heels.  It made me realize that I love the image of the put together flight attendant in a skirt and heels, but it's so impractical with how low our staffing is and how physical the job is that I always seem to resort to pants and comfortable but tremendously ugly shoes.  (Thinking back about the hair and makeup, I'd probably do both if I didn't have to pack and unpack my makeup every time and gamble on whether the hotel hairdryer has a diffuser or not).

Some other things that I realized are that I enjoy being the person that knows everything there is to know about the job, and I enjoy being a leader.  I want to be the person who envisions something or understands and recommends how to approach a situation.  I want to be an expert of some sort.  I'm good at advising people and I'm a great problem-solver.  These aren't just things I am good at, but I enjoy doing them.

I also want to make some money.  I've always maintained that I don't care about money, but the truth of the matter is that it is tremendously hard to think about doing anything to help others when you can barely help yourself.  I want to make enough money to pay off college and debt and be comfortable.  If I have money left over, I'd love to start my own non-profit organization, or a company that will have a strong base of pro-bono work. And I want to have enough money to travel (and stay somewhere for more than 24 hours).

I learned that I love living in the city right now.  I also learned that one day I want to live in an area that is safe for my children, but close to a city where we can have access to museums and the arts.  I want to go out into nature on a regular basis.  I want to teach my kids languages and teach them about different cultures.  I want to infuse them with my Catholic faith, so that God can be as much the center of our family as He is the center of my life.  I want to have time to cook scrumptious meals and I want to experience the world fully and tell my children and grandchildren all sorts of stories about my adventures.

In my personal life area I want to have some structure.  Even if I can deviate from the 9-5, five days per week structure (which I'd like to have some power to do), I'd like to have some structure with time zones, waking hours, and mealtimes.  I'd like to be able to plan each day and get up and find my toothbrush and facial cleanser in the same spot in the bathroom instead of having to pull them out of my suitcase every morning.  I'd love to take part in my community and in my church.  I'd like for my free time to be completely my own to decide where to go and what to do, rather than some of it taking place hundreds of miles away from where I want or need to be.  I want to be able to have a gym membership and not feel like it's a waste of money because I'm never there to use it.  I want to get tired at the same time every day and wake up energized after a full night's sleep.

And when it comes to meaning, I want to center my life around my faith.  I want to use my intelligence and skills fully doing something that I love.  I want to do something good for others and do something to improve the world I live in. I want to have a fulfilling career AND family life.  One day I want to be as good a parent as my mother and grandmother were (and still are) to me.  I want to start something good that will continue after I am gone.  I want my legacy to be a movement that helps people strive to reach their full potential and I want the heirlooms that I leave my children to be the drive to pursue their greatest dreams and the heart to care for and help others who are less fortunate.    These are the things that I want most in life.

I still don't know exactly what job title I will end up having, but I suspect that it will be somehow related to psychology.  The more research I do, the more interested I become in either forensic or industrial organizational psychology.  There are so many areas of psychology that would help me create a movement or foundation to help people be themselves and learn about themselves and achieve a fulfilling career, which is my personal goal in life.  I kept thinking about all the times that I wonder what in the world someone was thinking when they decided how something at work should be done, and then I realized that I could be that person and I could be really good at it.  I am still considering forensic psychology because I have thought of studying law before and I think that I could do so much in that field as an expert who can help children, or who can help the people that work for justice in our society.  I think my next step will be to find some people in these fields (the I/O should be easy because my aunt happens to be studying the same thing right now) and find out more about the different jobs that I could pursue in each one.

I'm also working on taking some IQ tests and some career inventory tests to make sure I'm on the right track and that there isn't something that I don't even know about yet that I could be even more interested in and suited for.

Overall, I think I'm on a very good track in my career search.  I'm close to finding what it is in life that I am passionate about.  Mr. Dorsey emphasizes the importance of passion in his book stating that: "Passion is the simmering energy inside all of us that boils over when we are living our greatest, most authentic purpose."  That passion is what gives you the drive to pursue your dream and overcome any obstacles that threaten to keep you from achieving that dream.

The next step is to move from the reading and research phase to the action phase, starting with talking to people in the field like I mentioned above.

DREAMS + PASSION + ACTION = FULFILLMENT

What about you?  What are your dreams?  What gets you excited?  Do you know what your "future picture" looks like?  What are you doing, or what have you done, to achieve the life you want?

JMJ

A Letter from a Girl on the Sidelines on this Day of Remembrance

OK, the title says "this day of remembrance" and obviously that was yesterday, but I started writing this yesterday, so that's where it really belongs and I don't want to change it, so here go the thoughts that took me two days to find the right words to express.  

I have so many things to write to you about, yet since yesterday I’ve been struggling to verbalize my thoughts about 9/11.  I have no authority, nor do I have any right to predicate on the matter since I was just a girl on the sidelines when it happened ten years ago.  However, there is something about a day like yesterday that compels me to write. 

Listening to the sounds of the memorial emanating from the TV in my living room, I could hear clearly all the names of those who died and the words of love and even the knot forming in the throat of the loved ones who are reading.  And with each name mentioned I felt the same knot growing in my throat and tears welling up in my eyes.  

I did not know the people whose names are mentioned, but I know that they were mothers and fathers, sisters, brothers, husbands, wives, fiancés who were engaged to be married, daughters and sons, and friends of so many people that are left behind today.  They were young and old, some with full lives and plans and dreams ahead of them just like me, others having worked hard for many years looking forward to enjoying retirement and grandchildren one day.  They were not at death's gate, yet.  They were called early, before their time.  But they were not called; they were forced along a death march that they could not have foreseen in their worst nightmares.  

Ten years ago I was sitting in a classroom in New Jersey, in Physics class, when they turned on the TV and we saw the beginning of a day none of us will ever forget.  It's strange because it's so clear in the way that it felt but so blurry because that day felt like it passed in a blur.  My grandmother came to pick my sister and me up before the school administrators had even gotten the chance to decide how to react.  They didn't want to let us go, but no one wins against my grandmother when she's protecting her family.  

She took us to the Red Cross to give blood, but even at nine in the morning there were so many people who had already had the same idea that the blood bank didn't have a way to collect and store everyone's blood without it going bad, so we were sent away.  I remember being disappointed.  I was so close, yet so far away from the tragedy.  I was safe while others were dying.  I was 17, too young to go to New York and help, but just old enough to give blood.  It would have been my first time giving blood and I remember thinking that I wanted so badly for them to take it so that I could help in some way.   

We drove home and sat the rest of the morning in a strange trance as we watched people jump out of the towers and ultimately watched the second tower collapse.  We saw survivors running through the streets trying to escape the giant cloud of rubble that inundating the area.  It was like one of those old horror films where there's a giant blob expanding and taking over the city, destroying everything in its path, except that this was actually happening.  

Then we saw firefighters, journalists, rescue workers, volunteers, combing over the remains of the Twin Towers trying to find survivors, then bodies.  We saw people posting notes for loved ones, letting them know where they were and hoping that a picture and a scribbled note would lead to a reunion.  Later, President Bush addressed the nation and assured us that "the United States will hunt down and punish those responsible for these cowardly acts." 

And over the next few days we saw what America is made of.  Americans everywhere expressed compassion and support for victims and loved ones and the resolve that we would not allow that kind of act to go unpunished.  Those who could, helped.  Those who couldn't, prayed.  Everyone wept.  

Here we are, ten years later.  I have since moved to New York and it feels like I am a tiny part of the city and the city is a huge part of me.  This is the city where I first became independent.  This is the city that offered me my first internship, just a few steps away from Ground Zero, as a Clerk at the New York Board of Trade.  This city has welcomed me in like it welcomed so many others before me.  People allege that New Yorkers are not friendly and I really have to argue with that.  New Yorkers might not be smiling all the time, they might be in a rush to get here or go there while putting up with millions of tourists that will stop walking with no warning in the middle of a crowded sidewalk as though there is nothing going on around them, BUT New Yorkers take care of each other. 

I am now a Flight Attendant based in New York City and there isn’t a day that I am not alert and watching everyone and everything that happens on my plane.  However, some of the flights that I feel safest on are the flights to and from New York, because I know that my New Yorkers won’t let anything strange go unnoticed or unaddressed.  It’s just like what we see on the subway: “If you see something, say something.”  And for that attitude, I am lucky that this city adopted me and I’ll be lucky if one day I have the right to call myself a New Yorker. 

Facing the Stress Monster

Stress comes at me from all directions most of the time: there are bills, work/life balance issues, high-maintenance customers and sometimes annoying co-workers, not to mention the stress of trying to figure out what you want to be when you grow up while you're all grown up and everyone's waiting for you to make up your mind already.  That's right, I admit that many of the aspects of my life that are good can also bring stress.  So, what is the correct way to deal with it? 

I started thinking about this a while ago when I was listening to a friend tell me about a situation that was inundating her life with stress.  I felt so bad for her and at the same time, seeing her pitfalls helped me realize that I shared in some of the same bad habits.  I realized, after losing track of time while we talked, that all that talking hadn't actually made her feel much better about the situation. 

Later that day I started to think of what better ways there might be to deal with stress and I scribbled the following notes:

1. Venting doesn't actually make it better, even though it comes naturally to us.  Limit ventin to one email or one 5-10 minute conversation.
2. Offer it up to God (suffering, problem, concern, annoyance...whatever).
3. If needed, dedicate 20 minutes to problem solving session on paper by yourself.
4. Choose to improve your day by MOVING ON and LETTING GO.
5. Tip the balance by incorporating something good into your day (time with someone you cherish {not venting}, walk in nature, clean something, work out, play an instrument, read a good book, watch a movie you love, take a bubble bath, etc.).  The idea is to do something that you love that will make you feel better about your day.  For some people or situations it might be something productive that makes you feel proud and accomplished, for others it might just be something relaxing and enjoyable.  Try to avoid things that are only momentarily gratifying.  For example, I have to avoid shopping when I'm upset because I'll make impulse purchases and later regret spending the money on something trivial.  Basically, find a safe haven for yourself to get away from the thing that is stressing you out.

Obviously everyone's different and everyone has different beliefs and coping mechanisms, but I'm going to try to incorporate these things into my life more fully.  I'll be sure to let you know how it works out for me, and if you have any tips, I'd love to read them in your comments!

JMJ

Thinking Fearless Thoughts

I've been mulling around thoughts on fear and fearlessness for quite a while now as, with all the wedding preparations and other life events, it took me a bit longer than I expected to finish reading Arianna Huffington's On Becoming Fearless ...in Love, Work, and Life.  Even once I'd finished it, I kept thinking about what I had read, trying to reflect on fear's role in my life and, more crucially, how to overcome it.  

Ms. Huffington divides her book into chapters surrounding the concept of fearlessness in different areas of life such as money, parenting, and illness.  Some of them applied to my life more clearly than others, but I definitely learned some valuable lessons from each topic.  So, here comes my collage of thoughts inspired by her musings:

• Body: We all have anxieties concerning our bodies.  A few secrets on looking good that go beyond eating healthily and excercising include getting enough sleep, helping others, and self-confidence.  These three things can improve the way we look to others and ourselves.  My latest thought on body image is this: we're not perfect and we'll always strive to improve, so, for every action that you take to improve your body, think of something you love about your body. 
• Love: The fears of loneliness and rejection point to the way we feel about our shortcomings.  In some way many of us feel that if we have someone there loving us that it means that we are good enough and that boosts our self-esteem; it's a sign of approval.  The thing is, what attracts someone more than anything else (in a healthy relationship) is our sense of confidence in ourselves.  So, what do we need the most?  We need to relax and see who we are and love and approve of who we are so that we can be ourselves.  Then, love can flourish in a healthy way and be sustained.  On the other side of the love coin, we sometimes experience a good fear, the kind that points out red flags when something is wrong.  That is the fear that we need to listen to.  The thing is that, if we've been listening to the first kind of fear about acceptance and approval, that one will drown out the other fear if it is there, and we can end up staying in an unhealthy relationship.  The third kind of "love fear" that we encounter is that fear after a relationship has ended.  How do we pick up the pieces of our life that now has a big hole torn right out of it and move on, and how do we trust enough to allow anyone to form part of our life again?  That's just a choice that we have to make, along with a commitment to keeping our heart open and not allowing what was not right for us to prevent us from embracing what is.  Finally, there is what you find in real love and it is about knowing that person and allowing them to know you intimately, in a way that goes beyond what anyone else is allowed to see.  You recognize it when you find that you like who you are becoming with that person.  As Ms. Huffington puts it: "in the end, it's all about finding your best self, not losing yourself in another."
• Parenting: I don't have any children yet, so this chapter contains a lot of things that I can only imagine rather than identify with.  Mostly, it pointed out how much responsibility you take on through parenthood and, how many fears that responsibility brings with it.  Kids don't come with an instruction manual and, to make things even more challenging, each child is a completely unique little human being that will react in his or her own way to their experiences.  That means that if you have more than one child, even if they did come with instruction manuals, each one would require different things from you.  Ms. Huffington writes, "courage is the knowledge of what is not to be feared," which applies as much to parenting as anything else in life.  Parenthood magnifies the importance of each decision one makes, and parents' biggest fear seems to be making the wrong decision in raising or caring for their children.  The things that I hope I will remember from this chapter when I have my own children is that a parent teaches her child more through the way she lives than anything she teaches her, and that uncertainty and imperfection are guaranteed to be part of parenthood, so it's futile to expect oneself to rise above them.  The one thing I learned from my mother and grandmother that I think I knew before I read it in this book is to love your child unconditionally. 
• Career: A woman's career seems just as fraught with danger as a mine field these days.  We are smart and knowledgeable, yet that societal requirement we have to be nice and get along can hold us back in our work environments.  If we gather the courage to behave with more assertiveness and ambition we can be perceived as being arrogant and pushy.  So, we're either left behind as men, who are expected to be confident and ambitious, climb their way higher, or we somehow work our way up, but sacrifice social connections and workplace rapport in the process.  Everyone knows that it is lonely at the top, but for women trying to go somewhere with their careers, it can be lonely at every level.  Beyond that, we fear failure, so we don't take risks, and we fear that success comes with a price, sacrifices in our personal lives that as women we are hesitant or unwilling to accept.  We want it all, but we know that you can't have your cake and eat it too, so, what do we do?  Add to that the fears of criticism (which tells us we're not perfect) and the workaholism that many of us fall into to compensate for our perceived shortcomings, and the workplace can be quite daunting.  How are we supposed to have a fulfilling personal life while getting what we want out of our careers while getting along with everyone, and making our voice heard? 
• Know who you are and be yourself.
• Be assertive but keep a sense of humor.
• Not everyone can like you, know that if someone is criticizing you, you are probably doing something right.
• Think of the cost of failure versus the cost of not doing anything in the first place.  You might be upset if you fail, but you'll know that you took on something big and that you can do that again.  
• Focus on the goal rather than the fear.
• Just keep moving... and watch as the momentum makes the obstacles disappear.  
• Recognize your value and negotiate for what you deserve.
• Where there is fear there is an important challenge and, with that, comes the opportunity for growth.  Learn to embrace the fear and use it to drive your energy and effort.
• There is no success without risk and no risk without fear.  You must embrace the fear to meet success.
•  Money: This touchy subject connects to so many different parts of our lives, not out of choice, but because of the way the world works.  We do, however, get to choose how tight a hold of us we allow it to have and what our attitude towards it will be.  First think of what is important to you in life.  Chances are, you will be happier pursuing a career that you love that pays less than a career that you dislike that pays much more.  Then, think of what you really need.  Our society prizes possessions and money power, but is that what you prize?  I always said that I'd rather have a job that I enjoyed that also allowed me to enjoy my personal life than a job that required me to work crazy hours in order to make enough money to buy a yacht that I would never have the time off to enjoy.  This is where it gets personal.  What is the most important to you?  On a business note, if you are raising money, remember that you are offering people an opportunity to take part in something worthy, so do not view yourself as a beggar asking for a hand-out.  Finally, if you give a little of what you have to someone that has less, you will always plainly see how much you are blessed to have (remember that in the Happiness Project the author discovered that statistically, people who give to charity actually make more money).
• Aging and illness: Some societies view the elderly as the wise ones to be revered, or at least respected.  In our society today, unfortunately, we fear growing in years as we see the health of our bodies decline, feel the capacity of our brains to keep up with the new technologies slowing down, and ultimately fear being relegated to some obscure corner of society as something inconvenient and useless.  Maybe this viewpoint lies on the more pessimistic side of the spectrum, but those are views, or at least fears, that people have.  Aging cannot be prevented, but how we approach it is completely in our control.  Take care of your body and your spirit; let go of things that are not good for you physically, emotionally, mentally, and spiritually; continue to DREAM; don't let the critics get you down when you do something, the important thing is that you are doing something; ignore the past and the mirror and focus on the possibilities that lie ahead; find some older women who are doing it right to look up to and learn from; embrace simplicity; find peace.  
• God/death: Ms. Huffington's chapter on being fearless about God and about death was very interesting to read.  In our American culture we collectively avoid these topics.  We avoid talking about death because it is uncomfortable to face and we avoid the topic of God because we have allowed those that don't believe in God to convince us that we are somehow mistreating them or subjecting others to an unwanted concept if we speak of our beliefs.  We have come to a point where we try to be politically correct and indiscriminate towards those who don't believe by relegating our faith into the shadows of our personal life.  Ms. Huffington bravely approaches these two taboo topics and voices ideas that are bound to be found dated and "uncool" by many.  The ideas presented are rather difficult to introduce succinctly, so I’ll just include a few quotes from the chapter that caught my eye the most:
• “Reintegrating the spiritual and the everyday is the key to fearlessness.  But ending this division is not easy when we’ve stopped even acknowledging that we live caught between these two worlds.”
• “If you believe in a God who only judges and punishes, or if you believe that there is nothing but an accidental, indifferent universe, it’s going to be incredibly hard to move from fear to fearlessness because, after all, the essential characteristic of fearlessness is trust.  It’s the trust that there is meaning in our lives, even when our limited minds are unable to see it.”
• “The instinct for spirituality is hardwired in us.  This is our fourth instinct, the one beyond the instincts of survival, power, and sex.”
• “Ultimately, to reach fearlessness… we need to bring into our daily lives a grace beyond our minds and our emotions.  There is no better way to do this than with a daily practice.”
• “Once we recognize that even when we put everything we have into a project or a relationship, many factors beyond our control determine the outcome, a lot of the stress and fear evaporate.  And we can live in grace.”
• “Quiet time before the world starts spinning is crucial both to nourishing the soul and being effective in the world.”
• “When we look at our world from a higher point of view, all our fears are put into perspective and even our biggest problems become less intimidating.”
• “The ancient Romans used to carve MM on the bases of statues and on the trunks of trees.  The letters stand for Memento Mori: Remember Death.  This was not intended as a sign of morbidity but as a mental tool with which to overcome the fear of the unknown, a way to come to terms with life’s  only inevitability… Remembering death… can help us appreciate life to the fullest.”
• Leadership and speaking out: We have a responsibility in life not only to pay attention to our nation’s leaders and partake in our government, but even more importantly to be leaders ourselves and to speak out for what we believe in.  The first step is something that Ms. Huffington calls “fearless individualism,” through which we know who we are as individuals and feel comfortable and confident in our own skin.  Then you take that and live out who you are through your actions and words, and in such a way serve the world.  This is the kind of leadership that every person is called to.  You may be a leader among your friends, coworkers, or the members of your family; and if you are true to yourself, you will truly set an example for others around you.  It is time to review our idea of what leadership constitutes.  Leadership is more an internal force that comes from the depths of who you are and influences others than some external dictatorial force that you subject others to.  Now more than ever we need to know what we believe so that we can stand up and speak out for our ideals.  There will always be critics, but it is our right to speak our mind and we should not allow the fear of criticism to make us relinquish that right.  Whether you are called to lead your family, or lead through example like Mother Teresa, or vocally like Martin Luther King, Jr., each of us is called to a certain kind of leadership and, when we learn who we are and what we believe in, we can find what kind of leadership that will be and embrace it.
• Changing the world: It takes a lot of courage to stand up for things that need to be changed and people that need to be helped or defended but are ignored; however, the rewards of taking a stand can be incredible.   The reward can be anything from knowing that a child did not go hungry to looking back and realizing that women can now vote and make their voice heard thanks to one person’s actions.  And of course one person cannot change the world by herself, but it takes one person to inspire the few or the multitudes that do have the power to collectively create change.  We think of heroes as people who are distant from us, different and better, just as we view saints.  Both, however, are people just like we are, and we have the power to aspire for both heroism and sainthood.  Saints and heroes aren’t born perfect models of self-sacrificing care for others, but rather evolve into those roles one step at a time.  Each small step you take to help someone takes you one step closer to being part of that group of heroes and saints. 

In the end, it’s all about knowing yourself and listening to your true self.  Once you know who you are, you can be confident in that person and live your life fully and fearlessly.  Which, of course, leads me back to getting to know myself better. Uncertainty and insecurity are two vastly different things.  When we get to know ourselves intimately, we can let go of insecurity and accept the uncertainties that life comes with.  

I was speaking with my grandmother the other day and she asked me to think about my future in a different way.  She asked me to think of what I want other people to think of me or to see in me in the future.  I’ve always tried to think of it from my perspective because I don’t believe in doing things for others.  However, it’s difficult to think about who you are from your own perspective.  Sometimes it’s more like being in a funhouse with all the mirrors that look like you in a warped fashion than like going into the bathroom and just staring into the mirror there.  And then I realized that what you want others to view in you are the things that you want for yourself (unless you want them to see something out of a sense of necessity to fit in or compete with others).  Since I’m not really interested in becoming a version of anyone else or a product of my environment, I suppose that thinking about what I want others to see in me would be a good way to step out of my own perspective and still get to know more intimately who exactly I want to be.  Then I can step back into myself and examine what parts of that image are already parts of me and which are the things that are latent aspects of my being that just need some nurturing and coaxing to bring out more fully.  Then I can work towards growing into that person who I feel I already am inside and allow that person to reflect on the outside.  Then, comes fearlessness.

Living in the Age of Preoccupation

I might only be 27, but I have already been lectured about eye creams and asked a million times what I will do with my life as though time is running out.  Your twenties are supposed to be your young and vital years and I feel them slipping through my fingers like a leaking faucet.  Not only that, but my hair is already turning gray, which everyone keeps telling me comes from stress.  Don't they realize that telling me that just gives me one more thing to stress out about? 

Last weekend we experienced the wrath of hurricane Irene.  Leading up to the storm I was a little concerned, but also somewhat excited.  I was collecting candles from all different corners of my apartment and filtering water into bottles just in case we couldn’t drink the tap water.  I wasn’t worried enough to fill the bathtub with water, which was fine because the storm didn’t even take out the power to my little apartment in New York.  To be honest, I was a tiny bit disappointed that I didn’t get an excuse to light all the candles and read by candlelight and prepare different foods and snuggle up to my boyfriend as though we were camping.  But I did enjoy falling asleep on the futon listening to the swooshing of the wind and the rain rapping on my windowpane.  I also appreciate that my family and loved ones were all safe and that the storm didn’t do as much damage as some people thought it might.  Anyway, to get to the point, since I had power and nothing better to do (or anything to stress about since I was just enjoying listening to the storm), I watched a documentary about stress.  Did you know that your stress level could be directly correlated to your position in your social hierarchy?  For many of us this relates to our job.  Scientists studied baboons first, measuring stress hormones in blood samples from baboons at different levels of their social hierarchy.  Then, a study was done with government workers in England and the results were that the lower your place on the pecking order, the higher your stress levels would be.  It has something to do with the level of control you have and the level of fulfillment that you experience.  Which means that you can compensate for a lower place in the work hierarchy if your true priority in life is being involved in some activity outside of work where you excel or take a higher position.  It got me thinking that the stresses that I attribute to specific daily life afflictions in reality have a deeper root, which is the lack of direction that I have been experiencing and ultimately the stress that I am going to miss the deadline to figure out what I want to do in life and fail. 

 

Finally, I realized that I am in control of this viewpoint.  I am the one who at some naïve point in my life thought that I could, would, and wanted to have my career settled, a husband, and a child by the time I am thirty.  Maybe some people succeed in doing that.  I have a friend that found out what she wants to do with her life and went back to school, planned a wedding, and bought a condo all in the last year, and she’s a few months younger than I am.  I am tremendously happy for her (and maybe feeling a tinge of jealousy that I do not possess the superpowers that she must have to balance all of those things and still be one of the happiest and most relaxed people that I know) but I now recognize that each person’s path is unique.  Well, I knew that, but what I did finally learn is that just because you are not ahead of everyone else in doing something doesn’t mean that you’re falling behind or failing.  My path has zigzagged its way through life.  Maybe it will continue to zigzag.  But now, I am taking control of my life again and I will be the one to evaluate and decide and reevaluate and change my mind if I need to about what I want to do when. 

So, I have now decided that my thirties are going to be great.  They might be the best years of my life.  My twenties have helped me grow and realize that I need to know myself before I can see where I am going in life.  I am doing that, so I feel like I am succeeding on my own time.  My thirties, well, those will be ten years that allow me to go after what I want, and I am now looking forward to them.  I always had this

A Tired Moment in Madrid on a Tuesday

Firefox is currently taunting me with 44 tabs that I opened with sudden vigor yesterday in the hope of making a giant step towards figuring out what I want to be when I grow up.  “Know thyself.”  Sounds easy, or at least straightforward, but in my experience, that project takes on a life of its own, progressing with fits and starts, especially for those of us whose idea of writing a final paper was pulling an all-nighter and finishing hours, or sometimes minutes before it was due.  I guess getting to know yourself is much like getting to know anyone else: it takes time.  Then again, you get to know others through conversation, but if I start having conversations with myself I might end up with more serious problems than not knowing where my life is going…

So, here I am, wriggling around in my seat in a way that would make my mother yell at me to sit still.  Fortunately for me, no one is here and I can jitter and wiggle and squirm to my heart’s content without causing anyone the desire to gouge her eyes out with a dull spoon.  I look around and my gaze is met by a multitude of sights: a cup of chamomile tea that I just steeped in the hopes of helping me to relax (or perhaps making tea was another way to procrastinate –I’m not entirely sure), my work manual that silently reminds me of a revision that I need to add into it by the end of the month (yup, that would be tomorrow), a short stack of magazines that I’ve been meaning to read and haven’t (the one on top is Writer’s Digest from February), the book “On Becoming Fearless” reminding me of a blog entry that I have yet to finish writing, a to-do list composed of twelve items (eight of which have stars next to them but won’t all get done), a perfectly ripe peach that I am saving for breakfast tomorrow, and a chocolate pudding cup that keeps tempting me to put off writing for just a few more minutes. 

And then I stop to think.  If, even in a hotel room that I will only occupy for 22 hours, I have a paragraph’s worth of distractions, how do I have any hope of actually getting anything done anywhere?  And then I think of Stephen King’s book “On Writing,” in which he talks about how you have this vision of being a writer with an office and a big desk that you sit at for hours, but the truth is that you have to live to have anything to write about and where you write can even be a corner of the laundry room.  The living part I’m working on, but the corner of the laundry room?  Well, let’s just say that I have issues concentrating regardless of where I sit down.  Then again, I haven’t actually tried the laundry room yet.  Of course I don’t have a laundry room, so I’d have to settle for the Laundromat and I’m not sure how the owner would feel about that… And see?  There goes my brain, metaphorically wriggling in its own right. 

The point of this, you wonder?  There is no point, except for the fact that I think everyone goes through this restlessness at some point or another and, as long as you keep working towards your goal, you’re still doing something right. 

So, keep at it, my friends.  I promise I won’t be giving up just yet.  

Wedding Bells Bring Change

Remember the bridal shower I was planning?  Well, the wedding is this Friday.  I can't believe that it's really the day after tomorrow.  Everything happened so fast.  I'm not sure that I'm ready for all the months of preparations (mostly Laura's, but I was lucky enough to be cheering from the sidelines through it all) to be over.  I know for the bride and the groom the wedding will just be the beginning, but it's strange to think that they are beginning something that I am not a part of.  Don't get me wrong, I don't hope or expect to be a part of their marriage, nor do I delude myself thinking that I was a part of their relationship when they were dating, but there is no doubt in my mind that things will change.

And that led me to think.  Everything changes in life: the seasons and the weather, the kind of plants that grow or go dormant, the birds that come to the backyard to eat, the fashions that people wear and the TV shows that they watch.  And that reminded me that people's careers are always in a state of change, too.  Very few people go to work every day and do the same exact thing for their whole lives without a single thing changing.  Most people change jobs and even careers several times during their life. 

So, where is my career going?  I think that a planned career change can be a little like planning a wedding.  There is a period of reflection and then a decision to move forward (check).  Then there is a period of planning what you want to do and how you'll get there and taking care of anything that you might need to do in preparation for the hiring process or for the job itself (definitely no check yet).  There are resumes and cover letters and interviews and callbacks (aka the daunting future).  Then, finally, the day comes when you take the plunge and take on a brand new job (cue wedding bells).  The difference is that with a wedding you know exactly what that day will be, whereas with a job search, you don't know how or when it will come about.  My question to myself is whether that day will come when it's due whether or not I am ready.  Or is it possible that I will miss that opportunity?  Maybe it will not come or perhaps I just won't recognize it if I do not prepare.

I've been slacking off a little in the personal discovery department since I've been sick and trying to balance work with wedding preparation stuff.  Even for the maid of honor, a wedding can be a big task.  I think that once Saturday arrives I'll be ok.  I know that things will change in my friend's relationship with the people that she is friends with, but I know that there will still be room for me in her life.  And while she goes off on her honeymoon and then comes back to make her new condo into a home with her new husband, I will get back to my self discovery project and really work on finding out who I am and where I am going.

Hopefully the next post will be about what I learned from reading On Becoming Fearless.  Until then, it's all wedding stuff because enjoying the moment you are in is just as important as preparing for the next one.

JMJ

The Path Unchosen

I do not believe in destiny.

However, I do believe that you learn things in a roundabout way.  What began with a detailed rigid year-long plan is evolving.  I am still sticking with my reading, though other books creep into the mix and I am not really "on" a schedule anymore.  I am learning that my plan to "figure out already" what I want to be when I grow up, has developed into a journey of searching for who I am in my core and a journey of self-improvement in every way.  I suppose that the only way to grow healthily is to grow as a whole.  I think that is why I cannot simply grow in my career path without growing in other aspects such as my health and my personality.  I cannot discover where my career path is leading me until I know the person that is walking that path.

I am sure this sounds a little strange, but every animal knows its own nature and I am seeking out mine.  For example, I've always wanted to take care of my health and I've always loved food, but I now know there was a disconnect between the two.  I recently began a (gasp...) diet.  It is called the Flat Belly Diet and it was created by the people at Prevention magazine.  Diets are not my thing; I've always strongly opposed the concept of dieting (having seen people go on crazy regimens like drinking cayenne pepper water and cabbage soup).  Having taken a nutrition class and participated in a nutrition program before, I know enough about nutrition to tell that this plan is healthy and balanced.  It is also (even in just the five days that I've been following it so far) teaching me a lot about my relationship with food.

I finally realized that I have issues with grazing and with portion sizes and, most importantly, that I need to plan in advance when and what I am going to eat.  If I allow myself to get to the point of being hungry and do not have a meal planned, my brain simply stops functioning.  I can work myself into a total frenzy not knowing what I feel like eating, because really my body just needs fuel at that point, any fuel.  I delay giving it fuel because I'm trying to figure out what I want to eat, and that's where I end up eating three times the amount of food that I need, especially considering that I tend to eat very quickly.  The Flat Belly Diet is teaching me to be mindful of my body's energy levels and relationship to food.  That, and it's promising that I'll lose a couple of inches in my waist, which is all I need to feel completely comfortable in my maid of honor dress next month!

The interesting thing is that at first, when I fell behind on my reading schedule, I felt very stressed out about it and was hoping to "catch up." Now, I've learned that life does not work on a schedule.  We choose which roads to turn onto in life, but there are no guarantees that they lead where we think they do.  Then it is up to us to learn something from where the path has taken us and decide whether it's a path worth following or whether our calling is to take another turn onto another path. 

The path I chose has wound around from career to body and self.  I have learned that I need to take care of my body (and my spirit) much more carefully than I have in the past.   I need to feed myself well, give my body and my mind enough time to rest and recreate, take away from the things that are stressful (especially those out of my control), and stop trying to do everything to be the perfect friend, daughter, employee, and person.  My new priorities are to be faith-filled and connected with God and my faith, to be good to myself (body, mind, and spirit), and to be a good daughter, girlfriend, friend, employee, and person. 

I am done with trying to do everything always for everyone.  I am now going to try and take care of me first.  Of course I will still love my family and friends and be there for them.  I don't think too much will change in that department.  I just need to be a good friend to myself as well.

JMJ

Stress in the Form of Matter.

Dear friends,

I know, I know.  How can I be considered a blogger if I leave you stranded for over two weeks without so much as a sentence-long thought or update?  In my defense, I've been keeping busy with some very important things that, until this point, for fear of alerting an intentionally uninformed party who reads this blog, I could not disclose.  Namely, I've been very busy planning a surprise bridal shower for a close friend who graced me by asking me to be her maid of honor. 

The part of all this business that is annoyingly amusing, is the one where I barely got everything taken care of in spite of starting the preparations about three or four months in advance.  I wonder if anyone has conducted a study on the correlation between preparing for something early so you're not swamped at the last minute and the rate of appearance of completely unrelated issues that need immediate attention as you approach the deadline of the first thing that you've been preparing for. 

It turns out that exactly one week before the bridal shower was to take place, I was scheduled to have two days off.  The first was meant for resting and attending another friend's bachelorette party and the second day would be devoted to ensuring that all the components of the shower were planned properly and being taken care of by the bride's mother, myself, or delegated to another responsible party.  Well, for the first time in my career, I was flown into my off day.  The benefits of this tragedy include either four extra hours of pay or an additional day off.  Here's the catch.  The day off cannot be taken immediately (which is, naturally, when you would need it) but rather must be scheduled into your next month of flying.  I forfeited the extra day off and went for the pay, but then encountered the gremlin of exhaustion.  This sucker has been hanging off my shoulders ever since the unhappy event, making it extremely difficult to function and get all of the last details of the shower in order in a timely fashion. 

Then, as fate would have it, my roommate informed me that she suddenly realized that she needs to study and work full time once August arrives, which means that she could not renew our lease on July 1st, but rather had to find a place to live closer to work and school.  I completely understand and, although I will miss her dearly, can certainly figure something out.  The timing of all of this, however, made it difficult to maneuver.  First, when I called the landlord, he seemed fine with allowing us to stay on a month-to-month basis.  However, an hour later he called back in a panic, giving us the options to move immediately or stay two months, neither of which would work for my roomie.  Finally, we agreed to stay one extra month, in which time period I will find a new person who will move into the room and sign a new lease with me.  Thankfully, this is working out a lot more easily than I anticipated, but until this past Monday, the situation was very stressful. 

The bridal shower took place this past Saturday and, aside from the fact that I arrived at the bride's parents' place so late that I nearly gave the mother of the bride a heart attack, and the fact that I was frying chicken until about 27 seconds before a parade of people came marching through the door, I've got to admit that we pulled it off.  The bride was surprised beyond belief and had a great time.  The decorations looked beautiful, the food was delicious and abundant (my homemade sangria and guacamole were definitely popular), the bridesmaids ran some games and put together some wonderful favors, and everybody had a good time.  I even got to sit down and relax for a few minutes here and there once the party started!  I delegated taking pictures to a dear friend (another bridesmaid) who is fantastic at getting into the middle of things and capturing the moments to be remembered and, I've got to say, that was very likely the best decision I made in the whole planning process.  In addition to having created a party that the bride will (hopefully) always remember, we also have tons of pictures that she can always look at to remember the moments that made her laugh or smile or that simply warmed her heart.

Of course, the story wouldn't be complete without one last piece of drama to lead into the next chapter of my summer saga.  My schedule for July came out at the end of June and, in the midst of everything else, I couldn't figure out how to fix it and squeeze in the flight hours that I need around the commitments that I already have scheduled.  Thankfully, after a couple of schedule-frenzy-induced migraines, about an hour ago I gave it another try (probably the tenth or eleventh since my schedule was released) and finally, I was able to manipulate trips around and fit in 21 of the 22 hours that I needed for my minimum schedule value.  The triumph is that I was able to fit the hours in without giving up the four days off that I have between now and the fourth of July, which I was hoping to God I could keep off to catch up on sleep and rest and relax and recreate and... well, you get the point. 

So, here I am, drinking iced tea, writing to whomever cares to read, and hoping that your summer isn't quite as crazy as mine is turning out to be.  Also, I'd like to conclude with two thoughts.

First:

Stress is like air in the sky or water in the sea:

You can take a particular bucketful out,

but that area will simply fill in with a different bucketful of the same.

You cannot create a void of air in the sky or water in the sea,

so it is with stress, it will always exist.

Second:

As difficult as it is to deal with the stress, 

I know that the areas of my life that bring it into being

are the same areas of my life, 

that fill me with

great joy.

I accept this stress 

for all that it is worth in its implications

and in the knowledge

that it is not permanent.

I'll try not to leave you stranded for that long again.  Thanks for reading!

A Lesson on Time

I delved into my book on time management hoping to come away with a laundry list of secret tactics on how to master the flow of time and with it harness the power of the universe for my interests.  Ok, maybe I wasn't hoping for quite that much, but I was surprised (and a little bit disappointed) at first when I found that even the experts are telling me that I need to make choices in my life.  You know that saying: "You can't have your cake and eat it, too?"  I basically tried to defy that constantly, resulting in a cycle that made me feel exhausted, unaccomplished, and sometimes inadequate as I completed too many things, none of them ever measuring up to my standards of perfection. 

Then, I read Rita Emmett's Manage Your Time to Reduce Your Stress.  Its compact size gave it an edge when I was choosing which time management book to read.  It turns out that the book is not only compact, but also easy to read and enlightening.  I wish that all non-fiction writing were packaged in such a neat and concise little bundle.  Anyway, here go the tidbits of information that most caught my attention. 

·      The book goes through a very logical step-by-step process and the titles to each chapter (which spell out stress with their initial letters) outline it all very well.

o   Search for and select what is valuable in your life

o   Trash perfectionism

o   Reach for realistic goals that are both relevant and rewarding

o   Eliminate what you can and streamline everything else

o   Set boundaries at work and at home

o   Strive to recharge your battery daily

·      In a sub-section entitled “Take Care of You,” Rita Emmett wrote the following:

“Keep in mind the classic example of airplane oxygen masks.  The flight attendant announces that in case of emergency the oxygen mask will drop down.  The attendant also warns that if you’re on a plane with someone who is not able to care for himself, you should put your oxygen mask on first.  If you try to put it on the other person first, you might pass out and be totally useless to help the person who depends on you.  The same is true with self-care.  Take care of yourself first, otherwise you might burn out and not be any good to those you care for.”

It completely baffled me to read this.  Considering that I am a flight attendant and inform people of this multiple times a day, you would think that it would be obvious, but somehow, I had never made the connection. 

·      Reach for excellence rather than perfection.  Nobody is perfect, so rather than setting yourself up for defeat, why not strive to excel in what you do?  This thought took my mind back to high school, where some of the girls in my class bragged about being perfectionists.  I hadn’t even heard the word “perfectionist” before then.  I had always made A’s and B’s, but had never thought to try to be perfect.  I guess the funny thing about peer pressure is that it sometimes catches hold of you in ways you don’t even notice.  I never gave in on the obvious topics like drugs and social ‘clicks,’ but now, about a decade after graduating from high school, I came to realize that those girls made me try to be a perfectionist, too. 

·      Emmett addresses goal stoppers, the obstacles that interrupt and sabotage your progress towards a goal, and stresses the importance of recognizing the goal stopper, acknowledging that this is a normal thing that happens to everyone, and then finding a way to take even a small step towards your goal.  Taking the first step generally thwarts the goal stoppers’ power over your progress.

·      Writing down your goal has a magical power to help you work towards that goal, even if it’s written in lipstick on your bathroom wall.

·      If work is overwhelming, carve out a little bit of time to focus on life goals.  Achieving goals in your personal life can put things into perspective, refresh you, and help alleviate job stress.

·      Work hard. Play hard.

·      Remember how families would actually not do anything on Sunday?  They would go to church and eat together, and relax and reconnect and re-center themselves.  We’ve forgotten to do this, but only now that we’ve given it up do we see its value. 

·      If you do something hoping to get something out of it, set those goals in advance to help you stay focused.  For example, if you attend a conference, maybe set a goal to introduce yourself to x number of people if you need to network, or attend certain lectures that will benefit you the most. 

·      Learn to say no to things that remove your focus from what is important to you or that do not align with your values.

·      The author told a story about focusing on your goal.  The story is of three children who, on a snowy day, make a bet to see who can walk the straightest path across a field to a tree.  The first keeps looking at her feet as she put one in front of the other very carefully, but strayed off to the side instead of ending up at the tree.  The second keeps looking back at his footprints to make sure he was going the right way, but ended up zigzagging her way across the field.  The third child looked straight at the tree and confidently walked across the field.  The path her footprints traced were perfectly straight.  So, it’s important to focus on your goal instead of micromanaging yourself for fear of making a mistake or focusing on past mistakes.  A clear vision of your goal will lead you on the clearest, straightest path towards that goal.  This makes me think of this project.  The goal of this project is to find out what direction I want to move towards in my life.  So, if I learn anything from this, my goal in this project is actually to find my goal in life, or at least for the next step in my life.

·      “The question isn’t who is going to let me; it’s who is going to stop me.” -Ayn Rand

·      “If you don’t know where you are going, every road will get you nowhere.” –Henry Kissinger

·      “Obstacles are those frightful things you see when you take your eyes off your goals.” –Henry Ford

·      Eliminate and streamline:  Figure out what your self-worth is tied to.  Is it what others think of you, or what you own?  You control your self-worth.  Only you can decide to align your idea of self-worth to your values.  Next, question before committing.  Ask yourself: Do I really need to buy/do/own/join/spend my time on this?  Do I need this in my life?  It’s the same thing we should be doing with all the sugary and fattening treats that we sometimes crave.  This is a bit of an exercise in self-control, but ties directly to your values.  If you don’t know what you value, you cannot answer these questions.  If the answer to the question is no, then eliminate it.  Think about it this way: Who is the authority of what is important and what is enough for you?  If you decide that something isn’t important or isn’t necessary, or is in excess, then it is up to you to eliminate it from your life.

·      Use a time log.  This is such a hard concept for me to adopt because I’ll do it for a while, get so wrapped up in doing it that I spend more time on the time log than anything else, allowing it to become a distraction, and then forget about it halfway through the day.  However, the author emphasizes the importance of recording your actions in a time log to analyze where your time is going. 

·      Avoid “commitment overload” by learning to say no to other people’s requests when your plate is already full of things that are priorities to you.

·      Streamlining might even involve saying no to things that sound inviting.  The thing is that like anything else, moderation is key.  Too many fun activities can leave a person drained and stressed.  I am slowly learning this lesson.  My confession is that there are times when I feel stressed out about meeting up with friends.  I love my friends and I want so much to spend time with them.  However, there are times when I have so many other things going on and pulling me in different directions that, if a friend invites me out, I feel torn between self-preservation (that involves saying no) and the sense of desire to spend time with them (which involves pulling energy from emergency stores that I’m pretty sure are always close to depletion). 

·      The clutter monster.  Clutter is everywhere in my life, and it drives me crazy.  I know that my apartment is small and, to a certain extent, will be cramped no matter now many things I get rid of.  However, my space can get so disorganized sometimes (due more to my lack of time to keep things tidy than anything else) that I lose things, important things, and then rip apart my room while frantically searching for these things that I have misplaced.  I misplaced an extra camera battery at some point and when I was going on vacation I was so stressed out about finding it (and had no idea where it was) that I actually had to go online and order a new one.  Ms. Emmett talks about eliminating and streamlining information and paper by creating systems such as FAQ sheets and reminders on your computer.  She also discusses outsourcing tasks such as hiring a lawn mowing service or a house cleaning service if that is something that creates a lot of undue stress in your life.   She also mentions scheduling streamlining time, whether it’s a few minutes every day or a full day every week or month.  The key to the success of streamlining time is going into ‘elimination mode,’ where anything that you don’t need gets thrown out, recycled, or donated. 

·      Rita Emmett’s “Do-Not-Do List:”

o   Compare yourself to others.

o   Believe you have to work to the point of exhaustion to be considered a capable person.

o   Try to please everybody you know.

o   Spend your time acting on everybody else’s priorities.

o   Say yes to every request.

o   Think that being busy is a standard of success.

o   Consider it necessary to take care of every single person you know in order to be liked.

o   Believe that you never have time for your priorities.

o   Hang on to angers and resentments.

o   Try to live up to the expectations of everyone in the world (including you)

o   Strive to be so independent you never need (or are able) to ask for help from others.

o   Spend time on busywork that’s not important to you.

·      Multifocusing vs. Multitasking.  In this section, Ms. Emmett explains that when most of us multitask, we divide our attention and focus between two different actions (which she calls multifocusing).  If both tasks require focus and concentration, we will not be able to perform either of them well while focusing on both at once.  Instead, if you choose to multitask, make sure one of the activities does not require a lot of mental concentration.  For example, you might be able to fold laundry and plan your grocery list at the same time if you are able to plan your grocery list without standing in front of the fridge or scouring through cookbooks.  If the task is important and requires a lot of attention, go ahead and turn the ringer off your phone so you can devote your undivided attention to it and do a good job.

·      Set boundaries for yourself.  Respect your own needs and priorities and set boundaries.  For example, I am currently on a trip that I didn’t want.  I was on call and I saw that there were a lot of people that are junior to me on call, so I was relieved to think that they wouldn’t call me, at least for a day, and I’d have that time to catch up on sleep, cleaning my apartment, getting rid of some of my clutter, as well as catching up on reading and planning a new meal plan for myself.  Realistically, I couldn’t have gotten all, or even half of those things done if I’d had the day off, but I wanted to try because I am hardly ever home to do these things.   To my dismay they called me for a three-day trip flying out of Newark.  Basically, that trip was the last thing I wanted.  Having no choice, I went to work.  Exhausted, we arrived at the hotel in Pittsburgh around 11pm.  The crew wanted to go down for a drink, and they were so nice that I said I’d go down, too.  It was only when I reached my room that I realized how tired I was and how much I needed to just relax and take a shower and try out my new body scrub and trim my nails.  I was nervous to call and tell them that I wasn’t going down after all.  I imagined how they would call me a “slam-clicker” (referring to a flight attendant who doesn’t take advantage of all the places that the job takes her, but instead slams the door and clicks the lock until the next day when it is time to go back to the airport) and I didn’t want them to think that I am because normally I am not.  Then I realized that it doesn’t matter what they think, but rather what I know and what I need.  I called my coworker and she said that they would miss me, but it wasn’t as difficult as I’d imagined and, once I had hung the phone up, I felt so proud of myself for being good to me and doing what I needed to do to stay healthy and sane. 

·      Set time aside to “recharge your battery” every day.  This single thing can prevent you from getting burned out.  Maybe for you it’s taking a warm bath with a nicely scented scrub, working out, going for a walk with your dog or kids or husband or boyfriend or friend or just you and God, or maybe it’s pulling out your viola or flute (you know who you are), or curling up in a comfy armchair with some hot cocoa and a good (relaxing) book.  Whatever it is, this is something that should be a priority.  Even though it seems selfish, this is one small thing that can refresh you so that you have the energy and peace to continue going after the big goals that you have set.  Also, notice that I didn’t mention tv.  I can’t remember where exactly I read it, but watching tv actually doesn’t refresh you very much, and in contributes to weight gain and health problems.  Don’t get me wrong, I don’t plan on giving up tv, but I will try to incorporate my battery recharging activity into my day before I start watching a tv show. 

·      You’ve got to do your part.  You can’t expect God or anyone else to take care of you and not do anything to take care of yourself.  A close friend recently told me she was thinking of whom her best friends are and if she would count herself among them.  I started thinking about it and realized that she, like me, puts her loved ones ahead of herself.  Together we realized that we are not our own best friends.  If we were, we would at least take as good care of ourselves as we do our friends.  Then we realized that we should strive to take care of ourselves and be our own best friends.  We are fortunate to have friends who, like us, take care of their friends (e.g.: they care for us), but we also realized that what our friends do or don’t do is out of our control, but that if we don’t take care of ourselves, we could burn out and get to a point where we cannot care for them either. 

·      You sometimes have to tell people what you need.  Sometimes it might seem like you contradict yourself from moment to moment, and that is fine, because our lives are in constant motion and things change on a moment-to-moment basis.  People don’t have ESP, they can’t guess (accurately anyway) what you are thinking, feeling, or what you need from them.  If  you know you have a specific need, it’s up to you to communicate that. 

·      The essence of a little anecdote in the book states that trying to eliminate stress from your life is like taking a bucket of water out of a lake, in the sense that the “hole” would just fill up with other water (stress).  Instead, try adding more sources of fun and joy and laughter into your life. 

·      Practice meditation, whether traditionally or by simply focusing on something calming very deliberately, like listening to the sounds of nature when you take a walk, or taking the time to write down something that you saw that was beautiful or that you are grateful for.  Even when you are completely surrounded by people and noise, you can close your eyes for 10 seconds and just listen to the sound of your breath or think of how beautiful the moon looked the night before.

·      Take a break.  We live in a culture that is all about going places and getting there fast.  I’ve mentioned this in my blog before and everything I read keeps reminding me of the importance of taking some time for yourself when you need to recharge. 

·      Make an appointment with yourself.  If you feel like you’re so busy that the last bullet point doesn’t apply to you, then you desperately need this one.  Think about it.  Sometimes making an appointment with yourself to do whatever it is that you enjoy doing can be as important to your health as keeping your appointment to the dentist.  Would you rather see the dentist every six months for a cleaning or put it off for five years and end up getting teeth pulled or bridges put in because you let your oral health go unattended?  It’s the same concept.  Would you rather keep a little appointment with yourself daily or weekly or would you rather end up in a quarter, mid or later-life crisis, in a state of depression, or burnout, or any other of a million things that can happen including belly fat and heart disease (which have direct links to stress) because you had too much to do to take a little time for yourself?

·      No more guilt.  No one should feel guilty about taking care of him or herself.  God gave us a body and mind that can handle a lot of stress, but they are not unbreakable.  However, He also gave us the tools to take care of that body and that mind and now it is up to us to exercise good stewardship of these gifts. 

·      Dr. Norman Vincent Peale is quoted: “Enthusiasm creates energy.”  In this vein, it is our duty to find something we are enthusiastic about that will give us the energy to incorporate it into our busy lives, because those things will help us sidestep burnout.

·      Some other energy boosters include: exercise, decreasing caffeine and sugar intake in favor of fruits and veggies, sleep and nap, drink water, do something fun, take a break, eat healthy snacks like nuts, get fresh air, learn yoga, eat a variety of foods to incorporate all the vitamins and minerals that you need.

·      Some tips to put it all together: put things into perspective (“if this is the worst thing that happens today, I’m doing pretty well”), decide what to do (at least figure out the first step, you can always decide later on the next step or change the way you do things, but you can’t change anything if you aren’t doing anything), start with something little to make the rest easier, give yourself an hour a week and use a timer to measure it (ignore everything else during that hour, including the phone), do the thing you’re dreading first (give yourself a reward if you need to), cherish the present because it’s the only thing that you can’t get back once it’s gone.

·      ‘The saddest words of tongue or pen / Are these four words: “It might have been.”’ –John Greenleaf Whittier

So, there you have the summary of all the pages I dog-eared in “Manage Your Time to Reduce Your Stress.”  It was a great book and, although I was upset and stressed out that I hadn’t yet gotten around to blogging about it (or blogging at all in the last few days), I am happy that I was able to review all of these little nuggets of wisdom a while after putting the book down.  There were still a couple of quotes and other tips that I wanted to distill from the book (such as tips on how to get better sleep), but I’ll include those in a separate post since I just wrote a novel today. 

As always, thanks for reading and accompanying me on this journey!