Wednesday, February 29, 2012

Life is a Battlefield

There’s this constant battle going on in my head between wanting to do everything in my power to be a better version of myself by actively trying to be, and the other part that thinks I would be happier if I could just be happy with what is.
Being obsessed with self-improvement can be exhausting.  Nothing is ever good enough if you believe everything can be made better.  You end up feeling like you’re not good enough.  So then you think it would be nice to just stop; to just be.                  
I think Nicole, from more is better, and I are having some parallel life experiences.  She recently wrote a post about her obsession lately with self-improvement and how too much of it can wear you out and make you feel like you’re not good enough at anything.
I believe that lots of small steps toward a goal is the most effective way to make changes over time, but I hate baby steps.  I want immediate changes!  I love a dramatic before and after.  The satisfaction of an immediate accomplishment – want.  This way of thinking leads me to never able to take the first couple steps because I’m always ten steps ahead.  If you never take the first couple steps then nothing gets done.
I also want to change lots of things.  The idea of just spending a few months focusing on changing one thing feels like an ineffective use of time, but really, when I try too many things I just end up getting nothing done.  Accomplishing one thing would be better than nothing, but I can't seem to allow myself to do that.  These mental wars I’m having with myself are exhausting.  Not only is it a battle on how to accomplish things I want to do, but it’s also a battle between doing these things or not doing them at all and just chilling out.
I feel like there’s a fine line between being happy and grateful for what you have, and settling.  If I could be more content with what is, then maybe the idea of focusing on just one thing might not seem so bad.
The trick is that you’re supposed to believe that when you start being happy and grateful for what you have, more good stuff just flows into your life.  How does ambition and hard work factor into everything?  In my head, these two worlds do not know how to coexist. 

Tuesday, February 28, 2012

Time Waster

One of my great frustrations of the year so far has been my inability to sit down and figure out what I want.  My rollercoaster moods and related inconsistent burst of motivation and the utter and complete lack thereof have made any sort of progress impossible.  I constantly battle with feeling that spending that much time and energy thinking about myself is selfish, and feeling like I really need to focus on myself.  This feeling is exaggerated when someone in your life is causing you unhappiness or frustration and you funnel a ton of time and energy into resolving that issue or helping someone resolve it.
I have a hard time dissociating myself from things like that, especially when it gets to a point where the situation is making you miserable and you feel like you have to separate yourself from people connected to the problem, but at the same time you know you’d be happier if you and the other person could resolve the problem together.
I go through phases where I daydream about living alone; being able to come home and the TV not be turned on and having to fill my evenings and weekends with activities that move me toward goals I want to accomplish.  In my head I imagine that anyone who lives alone and doesn’t spend hours in front of the TV/computer must be productive and happy.  You wouldn’t succumb to mindless channel surfing and fall asleep after an evening of doing nothing.  On a day where you came home from work exhausted you might take a hot bath and go to bed early, maybe curl up with a book or chat with a friend on the phone.  That sounds pretty great.
What would I do if I didn’t watch any TV?  I would probably spend more time outside the house.  I imagine I’d be a better, more involved friend since I’d be actively making plans with people.  I could see going to the gym or an extra-long walk with my dog being more attractive alternatives to sitting home alone in my silent house.  But I guess it would get lonely after a while.
Nonetheless, I think a more serious approach to removing things that keep me from being productive is a good start.  I think TV is a big one.  My roommate and my roommate/boyfriend are big TV watchers and I often find myself sitting watching shows that I don’t really care about.  This is dumb because I don’t even care to watch most of the shows they watch.  It’s also frustrating because my boyfriend is a bit TV obsessed and I feel like a lot of the time we spend together is watching TV.  He always says that we spend all our time together, but I feel like we rarely do anything other than sit in front of the television.
Another thing I keep coming back to is mornings.  I’m so exhausted in the morning I’m always hitting snooze.  Waking up early and spending more time getting ready, eating breakfast, walking my dog in the morning or whatever it is morning people do, I think would make me happier.  Do I spend my evenings being super productive instead of watching TV and go to bed really early so I can get up earlier?
I get up and rush to work, I come home from work feeling tired.  I laze around all evening, go to sleep, get up and do it again.  My weekends are more of the same, but in place of work I sleep half the morning, add some laundry and a thorough bathroom cleaning.  I feel like life is just passing by.  I need to stop wasting time.

Tuesday, February 21, 2012

You Better Run, Better Run

I threw around the idea of running a marathon a while ago when making my first round of goals and quickly dismissed it because it’s not something you attempt if you’re not serious about it.
I recently finished reading Born to Run by Christopher McDougall, a departure from the novels I usually read.  It was a mix of a true story, with several tangent stories of side characters and their relationship to running.  Some were ultra-marathoners themselves, researcher or trainers. 
I’d always thought of a marathon as an accomplishment goal, but I’d never thought of running a marathon in terms of running.  Why we run, what it takes, what you learn about yourself when you get your body to a point where it can run 30 miles.  Ultra marathoners run crazy long distances.  The book discusses several 50 mile and even 100 mile races.  100 miles, that’s almost 4 back to back marathons.
Cardio and I are not friends.  So to get to a point where I can run for 30 minutes or an hour already seems daunting.  There was a line in the book that said, “If you don’t have answers to your problems after a four-hour run, you ain’t getting them.”  The idea of self-discovery at the end of a long run is intriguing. 
I’ve been thinking a lot about running.  I’ve even gone down to the little gym in my apartment building and ran a few times.  I also bought some toe shoes, also known as Vibram five fingers, and I love them.  They are seriously so fun; they make me want to run just so I can wear them. 
I downloaded some marathon training schedules.  There’s a schedule for the half marathon I found that is for three months of preparation.  At the end of February will be exactly three months until the big annual marathon(s) in my city.  I figure, train for the half, if you do well with it run the half, if not, do the 10K.