I have said several times that one of the reasons I chose Taiji is because it’s the lazy martial art. My teacher told me this in the first few classes I took. It’s about exerting as little energy/effort as possible for the maximum output. It spoke to me because I’m lazy. Or rather, it’s really difficult for me to make myself do things–even things I want to do.
When K used to live here, We would go out roughly once a month–usually dancing. We would set a time and I would drag myself to her place right on time. But it would take me a half hour to talk myself into getting up and getting dressed. Then, I would sit and watch her for half an hour as she dithered over what to wear. Usually, her husband would finally tell her what to wear, and she would reluctantly put it on. He has great fashion taste, by the way.
Finally, about forty-five minutes after the time we were supposed to get going, we’d leave. she would drive us to where we had to be, and I would get the drinks from the bartender–even if I didn’t want one (I had one a night). This is one reason we’re such good friends–we complement each other. I hate driving; she loves it. She hates getting drinks from the bar; I don’t mind at all. When we went to dinner, we’d split the tab equally and she would pay the tip because she had drinks and I did not.
I have said to her repeatedly that we will be at the same old person’s homeand heckling the other inmates. She laughed, but she knows it’s true. Or maybe not because we’re the opposites when it comes to environment. She grew up in Miami. I am Minnesota born and bred. She’s happiest when it’s over 80. My sweet spot is freezing and below. Though, to be honest, since perimenopause, she has preferred lower temps. And for me, perimenopause has made me actually have chills.
Anyway! We have talked about how difficult it is to get going, even when it’s something we want to do. I think that’s another reason we work well together–because we both understand that overcoming inertia takes a lot of energy. We both like just sitting on the back porch and chilling (used to smoke. Don’t any longer). We don’t even need to talk. That’s the thing I like best about being with her and Ian. With both of them (separately), I can just be me. I don’t have to perform. At all.
With almost everyone else, I have to put on the mask and act in a certain way. It’s second nature by now, but it’s tiring. I hate it. I hate always self-censoring and making sure that I’m palatable for cosnumption. With K and Ian, none of that matters. Same with my brother, too. And my Taiji teacher to a certain extent.
I’m extremely lucky that I have four people in my life with whom I can just be. And breathe. My brother is the only person I feel I can yell at. Partly because he has a way of saying things that sets me off, but also because he doesn’t take it personally. He takes very little personally. I do know that when he raises his voice in reply, though, that it’s time to turn it down a notch.
I can be emotionally honest with these four in a way I cannot be with the population in general. I know I’m weird. But I have to sand down the edges when interacting with normies. Not just because I don’t want to freak them out, but because it’s not safe for me. And it doesn’t make me feel good to be goggled at like I have three heads.
How did I–never mind. The point is that I have to get over my own mind and all the blocks I have in it before I can do anything. Even as simple as go to Cubs and pick up what I need to make a chowder. I mean, running to Cubs would not be a big deal except for the added issue of the slow cooker not even being out of the box yet. No, it should be no big thing, but it is. Because that’s how my brain works. And I’ve just accepted it. Honestly, once I realized taht my brain will throw up obstacles to me doing things in a normal time frame, it made it easier for me to move forward. It’s the same with deadlines. Once I realized that I worked to the back of deadlines, I actually got them done earlier. Not early, mind you, but earlier.
This falls into the category of flaws I am not going to fix. Yes, I made tweaks, but I am not ever going to be the person who will get things done immediately. And I’m fine with that. I think that’s the more important thing. Realizing that all the stressing I was doing about it wasn’t helping. I was not going to ever be the person who did things upon receiving them.
The best I could do was to make it so that I did not feel bad about starting later in the cycle. And that I still got it done on time (or close enough for government work). That change in mentality helped a great deal because I did not need to castigate myself for something that I was not going to change. In fact, I would say that it hindered me in changing my behavior because I was focusing so much on being ashamed of my laziness.
All of this to say that I will get to the slow cooker when I do. Probably a few days from now, I’ll suddenly decide to just do it–and do it. That’s how I work. i mull over it for ages, procrastinating forever, and then I jsut do it. I do not know why my brain works that way; I just know it does.
I will say that my goal is to do it this week. I want to make chowder, and I want to make it now. And once I do, I predict that it’s all I’ll make for several weeks because that’s also how my brain works. I glom on to what I actually know how to do. I’m presuming it’ll turn out ok. If not, tthen I’ll tweak it. That’s the other issue, by the way. I have the fear of failing. Even though logically I know that if it doesn’t turn out ok, it’s fine in the long run, I still feel like it’ll be catastrophic if I ‘fail’.