Fighting for my no-drama zone
Mar. 12th, 2009 04:10 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
threadwalkerLast night I had an amazing 5 minute chat with someone. We agreed that we need time to reflect ... real time to sit down and just navel gaze in order to process our lives in order to free us up mentally/emotionally to do other things. And we (the other person and I) don't get enough time for this.
This was a huge relevation to me. I experienced a lot of mental down time skiing and then even more unlooked for down-time when I was stuck on the sofa for 3 days.
I feel like I slide into and out of insanity because my life is so structured and I don't have time for just laying around and processing my thoughts. This fluxuating insanity drives me to flip from involving myself in life around me and then totally pulling back to reassess since (in my creeping insanity) I'm suddenly convinced I'm spread too thin. I have no sense of calibration and no time to just sit and think. I've been chewing on this and last night someone encapsulated my thoughts and wrote the concluding statements: I need time to just sit and think.
And here are some of my thoughts. February sucked. Totally sucked. For many reasons that don't deserve revisiting since I still cry and I'm out of rum. I am choosing to believe that February is not going to foreshadow the rest of my year. I spent the last part of January and February withdrawing from my favorite past times and I'm done with that and I'm done grieving. I'm fighting for my no-drama zone. And, more important to me, I'm setting some specific goals. First, I'm going to work on extending trust which is a key topic in a book I just finished reading, "The Five Dysfunctions of a Team".
And now a few mintues spent reflecting on trust, so you may tune in or tune out. I think that oversharing is sometimes confused with trust. Sometimes I overshare my life and I can tell because people get that "o wow, what do I do with this info" look on their face. That's not really an act of trust for me, as in "I'm trusting you with some personal info". That's really a matter of "I've processed this info and it no longer has control over me, so you're welcome to know". I think it's confused as trust because other people either don't consider that appropriate stuff to share or their similar stuff still controls them and I'm not their entrusted listener or they think that I'm wacky. (I am wacky, but that's not proof of wackiness). The trust part (for me) would be if I shared something that still has a hold over me.
I'm bad at trusting and it's directly linked to family baggage and work baggage. If you trust people, they will use that info to hurt you. Period.
Being the Type-A, direct, driven, ESTJ person that I am, I've identified a few areas that I can work on that will force me out of my comfort zone. I am both excited and scared. I suppose sharing that here in LJ is also an act of trust, but I'm my internal freak-out meter is so worried about my actual "plan" that the fear of sharing it is outshadowed by the internal angst.
I need to learn to let myself fail in front of others. I am really good at going into my private space to train for races, to make things, research, prepare stuff for classes, etc. Working alone in privacy does not challenge me to trust others. I'm pretty good at trusting others to pull their weight on a team, although I frequently have a Plan B when it's related to my paycheck. But I don't trust others to allow me to fail; I am paralyzed by fear of failure when it's in front of people I don't already trust. Also, I expect others to hold me to the same (or higher) standards that I hold myself and since I'm unforgiving of my mistakes I assume everyone else will also be unforgiving.
Examples:
I am having the worst time following through on my desire to go to fight practice because I will suck and it relates to feeling safe to fail in front of people I don't know very well.
I don't admit in team meetings at work when I've made an error. I will let others point it out and I will accept the consequences readily, but if no one is asking about it I don't jump out and say, "yes, I goofed up". It's not always appropriate to bring that stuff up, but even when there's a prime moment for people to discuss areas of personal concern that they need to work on, I cannot bring myself to open up in a team setting because of how it's been used against me at other jobs.
I have the worst time trusting my boss with my work fears. Again, past has shown how that has been used against me.
So I'm going to work on trust. I have some plans for work. I'm going to make it a point to go to practice even when I'm too banged up to do anything other than sit and watch the fighters. I'm going to work on finding opportunities to push my comfort zone.
I set another goal for myself yesterday: become portable at work again. Everything around me at work is fluxing and changing and I am too rooted in. I need to let go and be ready for change.
There is much drama at work and it's very stressful. I feel like I'm standing in the middle of a frozen lake and I can't tell how thick the ice is. To add to my sense of "cracking ice" my director spontaneously swung by my office yesterday (after he figured out where I sit) and apparently "checked it out" while I was out. (insert pukey face). After I found out about his visit I cleaned out my office. The office cleaning was already an ongoing task, but it felt more urgent after yesterday and I felt like I needed to strip "me" from my office. I have that desire to be portable again, like when I was contracting. I took down most of my pictures and condensed personal stuff to a change of clothes, some pictures and some loose items in a drawer. If I needed to leave suddenly , I could fit all my stuff in my back-pack. I like that sense of being able to blow with the wind.
Anyway, I was sort of morose about today because yesterday my office looked like a pit and today it looks tons better. I was thinking, "too bad the director didn't come by after I cleaned it." Lo and behold, 30 minutes later he was sticking his head in the door again but this time with his admin in tow.
Me = stunned.
TFG I'd cleaned!
They chatted with me while I digested that saying, "be careful of what you wish for, it just may happen". The topic of moving me to a different location came up and he asked me what I wanted. I want to stay where I am. He seemed okay with it.
Fingers crossed it will remain that way.
I've been eating my emotions and it's a hard habit to break, but I'm breaking it. I challenged myself to save ALL my daily points for dinner tonight since we are going out. I've been grazing on carrots/salsa, tomatoes, mushrooms, spinach salad, etc. all day. I'm going to WIN. My reward? I get to set a new goal tomorrow and I may borrow an idea from WW. One member let herself buy a song off iTunes for each pound she lost. I may do that tomorrow to reward myself for being diligent. My weigh in wasn't too hot this week, but after inforced inactivity for the last 10 or so days, I'm not that surprised and I'm not beating myself down. Instead, I'm excited by the challenge.
And this is what comes of "time spent reflecting". I'm energized and ready for my next challenge. I'm fighting for my no-drama zone. I'm not beating myself down for being fallible.
This was a huge relevation to me. I experienced a lot of mental down time skiing and then even more unlooked for down-time when I was stuck on the sofa for 3 days.
I feel like I slide into and out of insanity because my life is so structured and I don't have time for just laying around and processing my thoughts. This fluxuating insanity drives me to flip from involving myself in life around me and then totally pulling back to reassess since (in my creeping insanity) I'm suddenly convinced I'm spread too thin. I have no sense of calibration and no time to just sit and think. I've been chewing on this and last night someone encapsulated my thoughts and wrote the concluding statements: I need time to just sit and think.
And here are some of my thoughts. February sucked. Totally sucked. For many reasons that don't deserve revisiting since I still cry and I'm out of rum. I am choosing to believe that February is not going to foreshadow the rest of my year. I spent the last part of January and February withdrawing from my favorite past times and I'm done with that and I'm done grieving. I'm fighting for my no-drama zone. And, more important to me, I'm setting some specific goals. First, I'm going to work on extending trust which is a key topic in a book I just finished reading, "The Five Dysfunctions of a Team".
And now a few mintues spent reflecting on trust, so you may tune in or tune out. I think that oversharing is sometimes confused with trust. Sometimes I overshare my life and I can tell because people get that "o wow, what do I do with this info" look on their face. That's not really an act of trust for me, as in "I'm trusting you with some personal info". That's really a matter of "I've processed this info and it no longer has control over me, so you're welcome to know". I think it's confused as trust because other people either don't consider that appropriate stuff to share or their similar stuff still controls them and I'm not their entrusted listener or they think that I'm wacky. (I am wacky, but that's not proof of wackiness). The trust part (for me) would be if I shared something that still has a hold over me.
I'm bad at trusting and it's directly linked to family baggage and work baggage. If you trust people, they will use that info to hurt you. Period.
Being the Type-A, direct, driven, ESTJ person that I am, I've identified a few areas that I can work on that will force me out of my comfort zone. I am both excited and scared. I suppose sharing that here in LJ is also an act of trust, but I'm my internal freak-out meter is so worried about my actual "plan" that the fear of sharing it is outshadowed by the internal angst.
I need to learn to let myself fail in front of others. I am really good at going into my private space to train for races, to make things, research, prepare stuff for classes, etc. Working alone in privacy does not challenge me to trust others. I'm pretty good at trusting others to pull their weight on a team, although I frequently have a Plan B when it's related to my paycheck. But I don't trust others to allow me to fail; I am paralyzed by fear of failure when it's in front of people I don't already trust. Also, I expect others to hold me to the same (or higher) standards that I hold myself and since I'm unforgiving of my mistakes I assume everyone else will also be unforgiving.
Examples:
I am having the worst time following through on my desire to go to fight practice because I will suck and it relates to feeling safe to fail in front of people I don't know very well.
I don't admit in team meetings at work when I've made an error. I will let others point it out and I will accept the consequences readily, but if no one is asking about it I don't jump out and say, "yes, I goofed up". It's not always appropriate to bring that stuff up, but even when there's a prime moment for people to discuss areas of personal concern that they need to work on, I cannot bring myself to open up in a team setting because of how it's been used against me at other jobs.
I have the worst time trusting my boss with my work fears. Again, past has shown how that has been used against me.
So I'm going to work on trust. I have some plans for work. I'm going to make it a point to go to practice even when I'm too banged up to do anything other than sit and watch the fighters. I'm going to work on finding opportunities to push my comfort zone.
I set another goal for myself yesterday: become portable at work again. Everything around me at work is fluxing and changing and I am too rooted in. I need to let go and be ready for change.
There is much drama at work and it's very stressful. I feel like I'm standing in the middle of a frozen lake and I can't tell how thick the ice is. To add to my sense of "cracking ice" my director spontaneously swung by my office yesterday (after he figured out where I sit) and apparently "checked it out" while I was out. (insert pukey face). After I found out about his visit I cleaned out my office. The office cleaning was already an ongoing task, but it felt more urgent after yesterday and I felt like I needed to strip "me" from my office. I have that desire to be portable again, like when I was contracting. I took down most of my pictures and condensed personal stuff to a change of clothes, some pictures and some loose items in a drawer. If I needed to leave suddenly , I could fit all my stuff in my back-pack. I like that sense of being able to blow with the wind.
Anyway, I was sort of morose about today because yesterday my office looked like a pit and today it looks tons better. I was thinking, "too bad the director didn't come by after I cleaned it." Lo and behold, 30 minutes later he was sticking his head in the door again but this time with his admin in tow.
Me = stunned.
TFG I'd cleaned!
They chatted with me while I digested that saying, "be careful of what you wish for, it just may happen". The topic of moving me to a different location came up and he asked me what I wanted. I want to stay where I am. He seemed okay with it.
Fingers crossed it will remain that way.
I've been eating my emotions and it's a hard habit to break, but I'm breaking it. I challenged myself to save ALL my daily points for dinner tonight since we are going out. I've been grazing on carrots/salsa, tomatoes, mushrooms, spinach salad, etc. all day. I'm going to WIN. My reward? I get to set a new goal tomorrow and I may borrow an idea from WW. One member let herself buy a song off iTunes for each pound she lost. I may do that tomorrow to reward myself for being diligent. My weigh in wasn't too hot this week, but after inforced inactivity for the last 10 or so days, I'm not that surprised and I'm not beating myself down. Instead, I'm excited by the challenge.
And this is what comes of "time spent reflecting". I'm energized and ready for my next challenge. I'm fighting for my no-drama zone. I'm not beating myself down for being fallible.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2009-03-13 12:53 am (UTC)I know I've been utterly wrapped up in my own little world lately, but I've been thinking about you a lot.
With regards to fight practice...
Date: 2009-03-13 01:04 am (UTC)But, in a recreation setting (fighting, running, etc.) the key thing to remember is Other People Don't Really Care What/How Well You Do. Truely. They are too wrapped up with how well *they're* doing to notice someone else.
Case in point: my riding. As I've said before, I was not meant to ride dressage. I don't have the right body and I have no natural aptitude for the sport. I've been riding seriously for 6 years now and ya know, I'm only now starting not to suck. Riding is very public -- everyone at the barn has seen me. But, honestly, they don't care how well I do or don't ride as long as it doesn't effect them.
I suspect the same would hold true at a fight practice. I think going in with a 'hey I'm picking this up at this stage of my life, woo hoo!' attitude will get nothing but a supportive response from teachers, but most other people won't care. So relax :-)
Re: With regards to fight practice...
Date: 2009-03-13 03:00 am (UTC)Re: With regards to bowling day
Date: 2009-03-13 04:20 am (UTC)I still have the golf ball that was my prize for being on the worst team.
Re: With regards to fight practice...
Date: 2009-03-16 10:24 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-03-13 02:46 am (UTC)Life is hard these days!
Stay cool!
no subject
Date: 2009-03-13 02:58 am (UTC)When I started going to fighter practice, I had to give myself permission to be the worst fighter on the field. I went in with that expectation, so when I really *was* the worst fighter on the field I could deal.
I went to WW today, after eating like a starving person since my surgery, and had lost a pound. I think my nice, dense muscle has gone away.
no subject
Date: 2009-03-13 05:43 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-03-13 05:51 pm (UTC)