End of Jan

So where are we at?

Me, social life, work

On Friday and Thursday night, I had a couple of moments where I felt I slipped up at work. My shame/embarrassment, my humanity slipping through, I recovered, but did I do the "right" thing?  I dunno. Maybe I did exactly what I needed to, maybe the situation that pulls me from my confidence, was exactly what I needed to recognize that I am human despite my best efforts. Ultimately, the small breach and loss of confidence, could be the best thing for me and my clients. 

But in the moment, my doubts were admirably present...  I had some of those - "does what I do, even matter?" questions... can I spend a lifetime trying to "help" only to have an endless line of people needing more. Yes. It's infinite. And my attaching meaning to the ups and downs, will always mean that I am dissatisfied, that I am undone by my doing.  What a funny thing to recognize. 

I was talking to my Dad yesterday while walking around the lake. Talking -meaning I was ranting. For just a moment, it felt like we were on the same page. The microcosm is the macrocosm. The problems happen at every level, it's how we respond. Do we become cynical? Do we become less attached? Do we become hopeful? Does it give us energy or steal it from us?  Some cultures respond to corruption with a shrug, knowing that it isn't worth the effort to try to change, but without adding any attachment to the outcome they move on. Others respond with a complaint feeling defeated, hopeless. How will we respond?

I needed space this weekend. I didn't really want to hang out with anyone. Didn't want my energy shaken. Time to replenish my stores.  But it was funny because most of the week I was able to do these brief meditations, 5 seconds, a few minutes, visualizing the energy around me, protecting me, universal, infinite. Then Thursday and Friday I couldn't do it. My mind couldn't see the field of it, and my mood was subject to the situation at hand. I was not grounded, or tapped into the universe. I was swaying. 

I thought I might be getting sick. Small aches. No fever. A little dizzy. I haven't been exercising and I have been eating way too much. But it went away quick. I took some naps. I went and got a massage yesterday. I felt good most of the day. 

Awareness of the gray sky has been a constant... it doesn't help.

I had all these weird dreams all week. Very vivid, not emotionally charged, but still impactful, and then I would forget them, even though they created the trajectory for my day. 

Today I woke up, read my horoscope and it reminded me of the thought I had in the dream immediately preceding it... I was "dating" Becky again, but it wasn't a real relationship. I had the realization because instead of hanging out with me she was attending a training for something. I concurred that I was a placeholder until the next thing came along.  I was disappointed, but not shocked. In real life, I haven't thought of her that way for like 10-12 years? I dunno. It wasn't that I was grieving the loss, just that it sucked to be a place holder in people's lives. Thats been a common theme in some of my unrequited relationships. I guess it is what I have been thinking about M this week, the idea of someone not caring enough to even try to be on the same page, because you're not meant to be long term... disappointing, frustrating. 

I know there were a lot of people I could talk to or reach out to this weekend,- and I chatted with a bunch of people online. But I guess I was worried that in person, I wouldn't get what I wanted. I wanted to be internal, to think my thoughts. 

Early this week, I wondered about whether I should return to writing my book. If that would be a more "me" way of contributing. One of the things I liked about writing is the idea that it can have tangible influence beyond the moment. And anyway, I am not doing anything else with my time... but it feels very out of reach. I don't have the energy to be creative because I am working. And it feels like this is the push pull I experience in a lot of ways. Work pulls me away from myself. Friends pull me away from myself. My relationships pull me away from myself.  But what would a different life look like?  If I quit my job or was fired, how could I make writing worthwhile?

And work is very fulfilling. I feel more and more confidant in my abilities, and my place amongst the staff. I do tip toe around things, but I also feel like sometimes my long term mellow attitude, go with the flow attitude, is tripped up by the world's desire for quick change. I get wrapped up in it too. Thats what happened this week. I thought some of my students were able to go with the flow more than they were, and they reacted, and I was caught off guard by the passion of their reactivity... they shared how it felt to be treated that way, and I realized I could have communicated more directly...

How much of my job is manipulation? it made me question. It's not a real relationship, and being "in charge" of their progress, means I have to hold them accountable for behavior, while trying to persuade them it is safe to change.  More and more I am realizing, I also have to persuade my staff to see my point of view, and that is annoying. It's hard work. I am still trying to develop what I believe, but I am aware that although some of my coworkers have great instincts, they may not have the bigger picture.

Reading and writing. I started book three of the Gentlemen bastards series, and it is great again. Book two was such a slog, and felt so uninspired and hopeless (the second half of book two was better than the first). The third one has all the drama and hooks, but with energy again. You could basically cut the second book out and it would be fine. I've been trying to figure out the differences, because it is such a different read, despite being by the same author. One of them is love interests. That definitely adds. Another is the element of their childhood, you see the bigger picture not just the grown men being battered. A third thing is that they are in their element (more or less) again, rather than being hopelessly inept. In general, it's just fascinating how different the writing of the same characters/story can be. I imagine people who read long series of 10-12 books must have that feeling a lot. like book 4 sucks but the author gets good again with book 6... My writing certainly has some of that. I've been struggling to even write some sections because they are draining. How do you keep the energy alive while the character is experiencing depression, or stuck? How do you create the kind of drama that makes a reader want to keep reading, rather than get cynical and stop?  I stopped reading the 2nd book thirtyish times... it took months!  the third one I have read like 100 something pages in a single sitting. How does that happen? How do you make more of that desire happen...

When I was reading a song of ice and fire, I always had that thing where at the end of a section you wanted to read more of that character and were disappointed -even resentful that he was switching to the next one, but each time I had that feeling. 

I realized, my book is basically Dune in another form (with all the same overlap). And I am ok with that. Dune feels kind of inaccessible to a lot of people, but it is the same golden path theme, it's a book about humanity, and so it is bound to have the same themes and symbols.  In Dune, I feel like Frank Herbert just skipped entire things, making one sentence allusions to it (which the nerds pick up), and then replacing with some beautiful description that doesn't actually mean anything. In the later books, hundreds of years could be referenced in the blink of an eye (because characters see the entire history of humanity), but it feels almost meaningless to the story in the present tense -which is why the characters all go crazy, but the reader is left wondering which thing to focus on... the allusion to the larger philosophy? or the present moment of actual story? 

My desire with my writing was to merge those in a better way. To reference the philosophies, and have them play out in the story in a way that felt realistic.  What does it mean to real humans to experience that? What are the real consequences?  Not a sentence about how a billion humans are erased by the jihad (though I have those too) but the impacts of living through it, or dying in it. What does that feel like? Not to a god-emperor removed from humanity... but to the people around him. 

It really is the same story. I should probably reread all of the dune books to make sure I add something original.