The Autodidactic Society
"Doesn't matter what you do, or how you do it, your neighbors are gonna talk about you ANYWAY." - Felder Rushing
Thursday, July 30, 2020
Tried and True
Friday, June 26, 2020
the shame game
My brain is doing loop-de-loops today. I’ve got this sick
feeling that I can’t shake and it took me most of the morning to figure out
what’s going on: The Shame Game. Everything I’ve ever done wrong, every bad
thing that has ever happened to me, all the bad things that are still happening
to me, my failures, my inabilities, my belief that in should-have-beens, all of
it yammering in my skull full time like a jack-hammer. My house is a wreck, my
life is a wreck, it’s all my fault, and I can’t seem to muster the energy to
fix any of it.
I should be in a better place in my life than I currently
am. Unemployed at the beginning of a massive Depression, dependent on an
ex-husband who thrives on being undependable, with three grown or nearly-grown
children who don’t have gainful employment, my house falling down around my
ears: I could go on for days.
Part of this is just how my brain is wired, and part of
what is going on is decades of conditioning that my failures are completely
within my control. I worked very hard for years on a marriage that was never
going to succeed because the man I was married to has a vastly different idea
of what marriage should be than I do. If hard work was going to save that
marriage, then we’d still be hitched. Hard work has a chance only if both
parties are on the same page pulling for the same goal. I’m actually happier as
a financially precarious divorcee than I was married to someone who did not
have, and never did have, my best interests at heart. Pretty tough to be happy knowing
that my husband didn’t think of me as an actual person but merely as a boundless
resource, incapable of being overdrawn, and requiring no actual maintenance.
Undiagnosed executive function impairments also work
wonders on a life. It isn’t a relief to be diagnosed when the script for lazy
has been all but imprinted on my DNA for most of my existence. I still feel
like I should be able to power through whatever obstacle is in my way,
regardless of what that obstacle is or what my diminished store of resources
holds. It takes a while to stop and take stock: This is what I have vs. this is
what is needed. What I need is one hundred thousand dollars and a stable,
secure job. What I have is a little bitty monthly support check. There’s a gulf
there that can’t just be powered through. What I need is the ability to form an
internally-imposed routine that can’t be immediately thrown off its rails by
every metaphorical shift in the wind, and that just can’t happen the way my
brain is wired. What I need is a couple of 20-yard dumpsters to get rid of the
clutter in the house that is also cluttering up my brain but – well, see the
above statement about the need for a job and cash. What I need is the ability
for bi-linear time travel and what I’ve got is unidirectional.
There is no winning at The Shame Game. I can’t go back
and change the conditions that got me here, I have no way of changing the way
my brain is wired, I can only deal with the here-and-now, and I can only work
on mitigation systems for the issues I’m always going to have.
So, I push away from what is causing shame and paralysis
and I do something that makes those awful feelings recede to the point where I’m
both functional again and capable of taking action on what’s actionable. Hence
today’s pushing away from social media doom-scrolling and then writing a blog
post that helps get my brain back on track.
Now I’m going to find my steel-toes and my safety glasses
and finally get that evaporative cooler framework done that I’ve been promising
myself.
Thursday, May 21, 2020
It isn't a set-back, it's a cha-cha
I had plans for the day. Not very big plans; I meant to get
some banking done and do a little decluttering and reorganizing of some boxes
that have desperately needed it for a while. My plans all got derailed early by
MB’s clear need to have somebody to talk to today. So my cleaning and
decluttering and organizing did not happen, but I did order the painting
supplies I’m going to need for repainting the house, and I did gather the Banshees
together to have a discussion about replacing the dead chest freezer with an equivalently-sized
upright freezer, and I did resolve an order for gardening supplies that had
gone somewhat sideways about a month ago.
So, the day wasn’t very productive but it was at least a
little productive.
The Banshees seem to like the way I’ve rearranged my
bedroom; it is apparently very much more ‘me’ in some intangible way. I don’t know
that I will leave it the way that it’s standing but right now I’m having fun.
Putting the bed in the middle of the room was a way to force a re-appraisement of
a score of little habits and points of view that I inadvertently developed over
the last thirty some-odd years. How do I make my room more useful to me?
What should I keep and what absolutely has to go and what should I tackle first
in my attempt to run through my various crafting stashes as quickly as possible?
Is this space a more peaceful space? Every little bit I clear makes it easier
to get on with the next right thing. I will never be minimalist but I am grimly
determined to create a space where all that I have fills me with some form of
joy, of happiness, or just plain old contentment. I like contentment. It’s wanting
what you have, and so much of what I have I really do want. After trying so
hard for so many years to cobble together a relationship that just wasn’t going
to happen, I have the peace of knowing I did my best and letting go of
everything else. My children seem to like me and want the best for me, and for
our little family. I have a roof over my head and the wherewithal to keep the
lights on for at least a little while longer. I have space for my thoughts. I’m
starting to craft my routine. I have, if I can just let myself get there, a
little bit of room to start building things: Furniture, stories, the rest of my
life.
I’m weirdly proud of the fact that I didn’t lie to my
planner. I had tasks that were supposed to be done by the end of the day and
they aren’t done, and I haven’t said they are done and I haven’t extended my
deadline. I’m still figuring out how to fold it into how I do things, rather
than try to bend myself into frazzles to fit into its system. Right now all I’ve
done with it is pretty much listed every single project I want to do as I
remember them, without spending hours and hours attempting to nail down every
single detail. I don’t have those details. I don’t have that time. What I have
is a list of what I want to do and I’m treating it like my attempts at filing:
What I need most right now is a place to pile everything. The sub-filing
details come later when I finally figure out what they are.
It also enables me to figure out what I want or need to
work on right now. Some of what I want to do has to have some structure built
before I can get to it, so those are back-burnered until some more life-construction
has taken place. I can put details in as they occur to me. Some stuff has to be
done now, sort of simultaneously. Okay, but no more than three very different projects
because the sub-headings alone are enough to give headaches. It just won’t work
if I try to make it something it isn’t, or try to make me something I’m not. A
few details, a little at a time, because I’m trying to build a good foundation for
the humble bungalow that’s going to be the rest of my life.
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