On not doing things, and then doing them again

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Hello my darlings. My precious petals. My sweet baby ducklings.

It's been so long since I've done one of these that I don't know how to begin.

I feel like I should practice this in my old bedroom, pacing the floor as a contingent of stuffed animals looks on.

“What’s that you say Eeyore? Yes, I should probably explain myself.

Begin as I mean to go on?

You give good advice for a sad blue donkey.”

*pacing intensifies*

When we last spoke, it was December of 2015. I was a few months into a new job at a travel agency. In a twist no one saw coming, I still work there!! (WHAT? Consistency?) Nothing has really changed in my day-to-day. Same job, same basement apartment, same general lack of forward momentum.

In the last 16 months I have gained a nephew and lost a grandmother (within a week of each other, if ever there was a time of joy and sorrow interwoven).  I have gained some weight and lost some hair. (TMI? Who cares—you can see it in my face and the way I part my hair, it’s not a secret.)  I have gained complacency and lost motivation.  (This worries me the most.)

I have no less than six (6!) posts in draft that were started and then abandoned—ironically enough—on the idea that I have trouble finishing what I start.  Perhaps about twelve months ago I took on a new methodology: don’t start anything at all. Can’t be a quitter if you don’t even participate in the first place. And so I stopped doing all the things that make me interesting as a person – writing, reading, creating, maintaining friendships, even watering my plants (which was particularly cruel, the poor things). I began to simply exist – eat, sleep, work, repeat.  Praying as though it were a ritual, and not an honest-to-goodness conversation.  Interacting with others like a robot playing a human role.  Basically extending as little effort as possible to actively participate in my own life.

I recently turned 29. I have less than 365 days before I enter a new decade—the one where even by today’s lenient standards, I will officially be an adult, firmly established in my habits, good or bad. I’m scared of being thirty years old and still feeling like I have to justify why I’m not a better person.  I’m terrified of being forty years old and still making the same mistakes.

And it’s not about having the perfect job, or body, or relationship, or even about where I am in life relative to others.  It’s about being comfortable in my own skin. It’s about being able to look in the mirror at the end of each day and saying, “I did my best.”

Not, “I AM the best” (impossible) but “I DID my best” (attainable).

Now don’t worry, I’m not going to turn this blog into some chronicle up the mountain of self-actualization, with Pinterest quotes and yoga pants.  With this post, I’m merely speaking out loud to myself the need to TRY and DO. Which means writing more. And putting effort into the things that matter to me.

I’ll be back with stories, because there are quite a few to tell. Despite robot-ing my way through 2016, there are some things worth sharing. For starters, my nephew is just a pudgy little blueberry muffin of love and I have to introduce him to you.  Also, I swallowed not a small amount of anxiety and went to LAS VEGAS for a work conference last August.  I drive a Prius now (??).  And then in March of this year, I went to Iceland (cool thing alert!!).

In the meantime, keep doing your thing friends. Like DOING it though, and not just pretending to.