Time Flies...

Wow! The last 2 weeks have flown by, each day with me thinking I need to update as I drift off to sleep. Opps! Let's see...

Small Victories: Got my library card, found a ton of books to download to read. Did 2-page spread for my Brave Girls journal project. Spent time with an old friend. Exercised for 20 minutes 4 days this week.

Goals for Tomorrow: Do Sunday Scribblings, finish week 1 of Brave Girl projects, exercise 20+ minutes on elliptical.

Today I am most grateful for: my amazing, awesome, sweet husband

I have embarked on my Brave Girls Soul Restoration journey, and was beating myself up for not getting more done this week. I have been so tired when I get home in the evening that all I can pull myself together enough to do is my exercising. Nothing was getting done, creatively speaking. Also, the house needs cleaning, laundry needs to get done, the garage needs to be cleaned out so that we can both park in it... the list goes on. I was feeling overwhelmed, and when I feel overwhelmed, I just shut down. I don't know where to begin, what to focus on, so I just don't. Well, Jason asked me where I was in the BG process and I told him I wasn't. He asked me why and I explained to him how I was feeling. He told me that he is fine with taking on all of the household duties for the next 6 weeks (the length of the course) so that I can focus on me. How freeing that was! So he shooed me off to the craft room and I was able to make some sense of and progress on this week's projects. Yay! Pictures to come on my creative blog soon, but right now, I am just basking in the happiness of getting something accomplished.

There's No I in Team

Today's Small Victories: Took all of my medications today. Tried a new recipe for dinner, which turned out delicious! Drank less soda today, which is a big deal for me. Writing a blog post. :)

Goals for Tomorrow: Get a new library card so that I can download e-books locally, as well as audio books to listen to in the craft room.

Today I am most grateful for: my teammates

It was great to get back to school to see my teammates today. I feel so fortunate that we get along so well and laugh together as much as we do. It was great to quickly catch up on each others' two weeks. It also struck me how much easier it is to work together this year, after a year of uncertainty last year. A colleague came rushing through our hallway this morning, grumbling about having to get "so much" done on his own, and after he disappeared we all smiled at one another. You see, we decided to approach our task today as a group, making it easier and faster to complete. While everyone else went the course on their own, we leaned on each other, without words, and had a successful day.

In the world of teaching, we are so often alone -- behind the closed door of our classrooms to fend for ourselves. It's often lonely and difficult, but when you have a team who not only shares your struggles, but also wants to help you through them, you don't feel so alone anymore. Today I am so grateful to have a team who works hard, admits their struggles, and helps each other the way we do. I love you girls! :)

Sunday Scribblings: Progress

In reference to this week's Sunday Sribblings prompt...

Progress is one the hardest concepts for me to acknowledge in my life. I am very much an "immediate gratification" kind of girl, which is funny because I am also a pathological planner. Anyway, that concept of "making progress" towards a goal is never as gratifying as completion, which is probably why I can be quick to give up when something doesn't seem to be going the way I want it to go. Diets are a good example. Making progress can be so small, so seemingly insignificant, that it has always been easier to just give up... move on. I want to see huge changes quickly, in order to stay motivated. The rewards need to come faster. But I think what I often neglect to remember is that there is more to weight loss than a change in appearance. In fact, that *should* be the least of my concerns at this point. The greater reward comes in FEELING better, doing more, and feeling better about myself. This is where I will seek my progress this time. Besides wanting to reduce the number of meds I have to take, I want to feel better. I want to have energy to do more and to give more.

Check back every Sunday for more Sunday Scribblings.

2011

Resolutions are not my friends, typically. I see them as reasons for self-abuse, at least in my case, because I usually make them way too hard to achieve. What I find more helpful is to set goals and progress monitor myself daily or weekly. I do this a lot with my students in their areas of struggle. It helps to break down a problem and set mini-goals that are smaller victories, rather than to focus on a larger issue all at once. It’s also motivating to acknowledge small victories on a frequent basis, and reflect on minor setbacks, rather than mentally beat yourself up when you feel you have “failed.”

All of that being said, I also believe that it’s important to have larger, longer-term goals to work toward. These goals are usually much more abstract, and the smaller goals lead towards achieving the bigger goals. Confused yet? :)

My 2011 Goals:

1. Love more openly and unabashedly. Be more appreciative and show gratitude.

• Tell and show people how much they mean to me on a regular basis.
• Sincerely compliment those around me on a daily basis, beyond just their appearance. Acknowledge how they enhance my life, as well as the lives of others.
• Genuinely thank people for what they do for me and for my students.

2. Learn to love myself for who I am, and who I have the potential to become.

• Find and journal about my own small victories every day, no matter how great or small.
• Reflect on my goals daily. Celebrate and make changes when needed.

3. Change/work on several habits to improve my feelings about my appearance.

• Sit up/walk straighter.
• Avoid biting nails/cuticles.
• Workout in some way at least 5-days a week.
• Be consistent about taking my meds and testing my blood.
• Meet with nutritionist from KP.
• Stick to a meal plan based on our weekly menu.
• Read more books for pleasure, rather than for work.

4. Be creative/improve specific skills.

• Write/create something daily.
• Complete online course with Melody Ross in creativity.
• Learn to make homemade pasta.
• Find and refine a really good marinara recipe.

5. Learn to accept the limitations of others, rather than seek apologies or excuses. This one is quite personal, so I wish to keep it private for the time being.

6. Maintain a more orderly home/life for the sanity of both of us!

• Help Jason with the kitchen every night by unloading/loading dishwasher.
• Create and maintain a schedule for cleaning and laundry.
• Build weekly menus prior to shopping trips. Stick to the list!
• Eat out only 1-2 times per week at MOST.
• Limit extraneous spending so as to pay off as many bills as possible.

Summer Vacay So Far

End of week 2. I'm SO sad it is flying so quickly, but extremely motivated to get some stuff done this time around! I relaxed way too much last summer. ;)

Week 1: Sleeping in. Hail storm. Tornado sighting. Cleaning. Laundry. Lifetme in the AM. 24 finale. Jewel Kade meeting.

Week 2: Long weekend with Jason. Quit Archiver's (sad). Shopping. Prepping for vendor fair. More shopping. Lunch with Lauren. More shopping. Must stop shopping. Vendor fair. Jason's birthday week begins!

Summer vacation resolutions:
1. Shower everyday -- no staying in PJs all day during the week!
2. Spend at least 2 days a week in the craft room.
3. Spend a lot of time in the pool (once it's up!).
4. Eat dinner at home at least 4 nights a week. This is a BIG one for us!
5. Watch less TV. No more Lifetime/SoapNet 'til noon.
6. Blog more. Both here and on the creative blog I am in the process of creating.
7. Eat a decent breakfast everyday. I have been very lazy about getting out of bed in time for breakfast, opting to stay in bed instead. Or I end up eating crap, when I know I need a high-protein meal in order to get going in the morning.
8. Take my meds on a regular basis, as prescribed. My pride and my need to feel "normal" have been getting the best of me for a year now, the results of which are an increased loss of sight, a right foot that is almost completely numb, and some pretty rapid weight loss, which experience tells me is due to really high blood sugar.
9. Exercise. UGH. I sleep next to an elliptical machine that cost us a pretty penny. I think I am going to watch an episode of 24 each day, starting with season 1, and stay on the machine until the ep is over.
10. Follow through. I keep saying that I want to get a wholesale license and want to offer crafting classes, but I never get around it it. Well, now is the time. That was what I wanted out of working at Archiver's, so if I can make it happen for myself, why wouldn't I?

Yikes - I could go on and on, apparently. But I won't. This is a good list!

I'm good enough, I'm smart enough, and gosh darnit, people like me.

This is not my original post. My original post was really for a viewer-ship of one. It wasn't nice, it called a particular person out in several ways, it was meant to be an end to a very one-sided friendship that I am finally done with.

But what I realized was that all the original post did was make me look like the bad guy, and it didn't do much to make me feel better, as I hoped it would.

Simply put, the decisions we make, and how we treat others, directly impact how others treat us and view us.

But we also allow people to treat us in certain ways, again, by choice.

For example, I have allowed myself to be used and taken advantage of by many people. I have this inner need for people to like me that has always been a part of me. A shrink would say it goes back to my need of approval from my parents, which I never had as a child. Regardless, it often gets me into trouble, as there is just no pleasing some people. No matter how much you give, no matter how big of a priority you make someone else, often putting your own life on hold to be there for them, you may not be able to make someone truly be a good friend back. My natural instinct, when rebuffed, is to try harder! Bad idea, and it only opens me up to being used more. But see, I allow this to happen! I have allowed these "frienemies" to make me feel guilty if I ask for something in exchange for my friendship. I have allowed them to make the friendship completely one-way and all about them, when friendship is supposed to be a give and take relationship. Well, it is, I give and they take, and then they GIVE it to me and I TAKE it up the... sorry.

Anyway, I'm sick and tired of feeling like a crappy friend because sometimes I want someone to ask about me. I actually managed to work myself into quite an emotional train wreck last week because a "friend" was being a crappy "friend," but managed to turn it around on me, which she has done before, and you'd think I'd learn, but alas, no. Well, no more. At some point this horrible sense of self-worth that I have needs to be beaten down. At some point I need to make myself a priority, like everyone else does with no problems. That point is now, dear readers. I am going to spend this summer kicking old habits and making new friends, and, hopefully, kicking old "friends" and making new habits. I am also going to reacquaint myself with some old friends and habits.

And, of course, I will chronicle it all. :)

I just killed my best friend. Worst enemy. Same difference.

So I have been tossing around this phrase in my head for the last few days, trying to come up with something worth writing.

Fierce friendships.

You know the kind -- the friendships you had in middle and high school. The kind that had you hating your best friend (the quote that is my title is from "Heathers," by the way). The kind that drove you to feeling like doing great bodily harm to anyone who would dare even give your friends an askew look. The kind that could both comfort you and deeply wound you. The friends who you would see and talk to all day at school, and then spend the entire evening on the phone with, talking about everything and nothing. The kind who you could laugh with until you physically hurt at comments and jokes then that still make you laugh out loud today. And you know damn well you couldn't even begin to explain it to someone else, because they'd never get it.

I miss that. I mean, I still have friends I laugh with, and that I care a lot about, but back then my friendships were more important to me than anything else. To have a group of people who not only understand you, but accept you as you are, is such an amazing gift. But age shifts our priorities to work and family. I'm very grateful for the family of friends I have now, but I do mourn those fierce friendships from my youth.