Dear Internet, Gratitudes and things that make me happy are a part of my carding coursework, and I track them everyday and I’ll post them here every Sunday. (And I also acknowledge this is going to take me a few weeks to go beyond “I have killer hair.”) You can also find the a list of all my gratitudes here. gratitude
This week I’m in Chicago for C2E2, the yearly event I have attended since 2012. Instead of my usual ten things I’m grateful for, it’s just going to be one big one, which I’ve been breaking down in bits and pieces over the past weeks:
I’m grateful for everyone who has given me support, cheerled me on, gave advice, offers of hospitality when I needed it, and so much more. I keep telling people the big lesson that I’ve learned in the last year or so is humility and gratitude. My life is still a delicate eco-system and I think on one level it is always going to be, but the foundation is much stronger thanks to everyone who has come forward with help. Really, I’ll probably be repeating this gratitude a lot in the upcoming weeks and months because I really am that grateful for everything that has been given to me. As much as it gnaws at my soul to say that I’m “blessed,” I am feeling pretty beatific these days.
Dear Internet, Gratitudes and things that make me happy are a part of my carding coursework, and I track them everyday and I’ll post them here every Sunday. (And I also acknowledge this is going to take me a few weeks to go beyond “I have killer hair.”) You can also find the a list of all my gratitudes here. gratitude
The deluge of places wanting to, or have an interest in, interviewing me
Publishers because without them I would have no books
I am grateful for yoga keeping me centered and balanced
The ability to make choices that is best for me not for someone else
For my internal strength. I may get knocked a lot but I always come back swinging
Dear Internet, Gratitudes and things that make me happy are a part of my carding coursework, and I track them everyday and I’ll post them here every Sunday. (And I also acknowledge this is going to take me a few weeks to go beyond “I have killer hair.”) gratitude
Ms. Lizzie Locks for her amazing kindness towards me and Thursday the Pug (She sent Thursday toys and snacks from her dogs, Sophia and Stormy. The dog is going insane.)
The internet, without whom I would not be the person I am today that is how important it is in my life
TheExHusband for everything he has done and will do to keep me moving forward
Potential employers who extend an interview request to me
The pug simply because her silliness makes me smile
Being biologically in excellent health
For people who do not like me for it reminds me that standing by what I think is right and true is the sacrifice I am willing to make over pleasing everyone
That we all want to love and be loved
Friends whom I haven’t spoke to in months and we can pick up just where we left off
I’ve said this numerous times across my site but it needs to be on the list — TheBassist for breaking up with me. It was perhaps the greatest gift he could have given me for it helped deter a terrible crash, deal with my issues, get the help I need, and make me a better person. Thank you.
Dear Internet, Gratitudes and things that make me happy are a part of my carding coursework, and I track them everyday and I’ll post them here every Sunday. (And I also acknowledge this is going to take me a few weeks to go beyond “I have killer hair.”) gratitude
Learning how to properly breathe during meditation
For being able to recognize the things I need to change
For having known my father
My car is in good shape
For falling in love with books to allow me to travel all over the world
My capacity to always want to fall in love with everyone and thing I meet
For finding out I don’t have breast cancer
The changing of the seasons to indicate that nothing remains the same
For people who are kind to me even if I’m not kind to them
For those who teach me about humility
happy
The way my skin feels after moisturizing it
Medium rare steak
The magnitude of available British television
Fuzzy socks
That moment between getting out of the shower and grabbing a towel and the temperature is just perfect
Dear Internet, Gratitudes and things that make me happy are a part of my carding coursework, and I track them everyday and I’ll post them here every Sunday. (And I also acknowledge this is going to take me a few weeks to go beyond “I have killer hair.”) gratitude
For the family I have chosen
For previous lovers who let me view and share in their worlds
For those I have met over the years who have helped shape me into the person I am today
For my pets who showed me what unconditional love really is
For Caravaggio for allowing me to not only fall in love with his work but to finally get what art history really means
For understanding that a million decisions brought me to this point in life
For crazy drugs to allow me to be healthier rather than crazy(ier)
For the wind through the trees to allow me to allow the gods to talk to me
For sticking to my guns for doing the right thing
Believing in the goodness of others
happy
An unexpected phone call from someone I love
Writing letters and the joy people have when they receive them
Dear Internet, Gratitudes and things that make me happy are a part of my carding coursework, and I track them everyday and I’ll post them here every Sunday. (And I also acknowledge this is going to take me a few weeks to go beyond “I have killer hair.”) gratitude
I am thankful for my parents for without them there would be no me
I am thankful for the life I’ve been able to experience
I am grateful there are preventatives for my allergies so I won’t be dead
I am thankful for Kate, the person whom if I tell her I shot a man in Reno to watch him die, she would shoot him again to make sure he’s dead and then ask me where we’re going to bury him
I am thankful I can often make people laugh
I am grateful my body is strong and healthy to let me move the way I need it to
I thankful my car is paid off
I am grateful for my champions when I went back to college, for without them I would not excelled or want to continue with my education
I am grateful for Natalie who gets my Jane Austen obsession and who can really make me think
I am grateful I have the capacity to share all different kinds of love with all different kinds of people
happy
Long, near scalding, showers,
Long soaks in a bathtub, when I can read until my skin is pickled
The way my body feels after I moisturize it with coconut oil
That first snowfall
Gerbera daisies
When I finish my todo list for the day and everything is completed
The smell of just out of the oven baked goods; even more so if I have baked them myself
Dear Internet,
If you are into self-help, woo-woo, DBT, or are a curious individual, you’ll notice the core of all of these practices contain two main components to help you along the way to being happier and thus having a more fulfilling life.
I’m going to give them to you for free. No more self-help books, sketchy websites, or paying for gurus1.
Ready? Mindfulness and gratitude.
That’s it.
Every website and self-help book will bury these ledes in the opening pages of their annals and yet build their entire systems around these two concepts. Yet once you get into the meat of their woo-wooease, you’ll find them all tucked in and ready to work.
How does mindfulness and gratitude work?
To achieve mindfulness, you meditate and if you meditate, you’ll be more in the present. If you’re more in the present, you’ll begin to feel less anxiety and stress, more compassion for yourself and others and a fuck ton of other awesome benefits. Being mindful helps with the awareness of what’s happening in and around you — a thought is just a thought, a feeling is just a feeling; you do not have to react to either one. Being aware of those things helps you make better, and more informed, decisions about what is happening around you. You don’t act on impulses or steer from difficult decisions. You accept that a zillion decisions brought you to this point, you can accept that you can make choices on going forward. It is not “things happen for a reason.” That’s bullshit. You know it and I know it. Stop believing in it.
Gratitude is the complement to mindfulness. Gratitude allows you to be thankful for what you have rather than what you want. It concentrates on the being rather than the material. You are thankful for your parents (yes, even if you are divorced from them) because without them, you wouldn’t be here. You are thankful for your killer hair. You are thankful for the experiences you’ve had to help shape you. You’re grateful for the friends who believe and support in you.
(A good one, for me, is to be grateful for TheBassist breaking up with me (shut it). If he had not broken it off and put clear boundaries on his needs, the cycle would have continued. I would have gotten worse. Crashing that fateful October day is probably the best thing that’s happened to me in years. The cyclical of my relationships wasn’t just with TheBassist but with other aspects of my life. I’ve accepted, and said a zillion times, I may never hear from him again but if there is one thing I want him to know is this.)
You can make it as large (I am grateful for my family for loving me) to small (I am grateful for my friend who rubbed my feet after a long day). The idea is to find one thing to be grateful for, every day, which will keep you anchored in the present and then follow the mindfulness train of thought above to continue on with your enlightenment.
(I know it’s going to take me awhile to get beyond “I have killer hair” and I’m okay with that knowledge.)
At this point you are asking yourself (more than likely) the following question(s),”Lisa, why should we believe you? Sometimes when you write, things sound cray. Seriously. Cray.” or something along those lines. Hey, I get it. I’d have a hard time listening to me too.
I’ve been meditating for 211 days in a row and in the beginning, I thought it was a crock of shit. But allowing myself to be open to the idea, and practicing the tenants, has really helped in the long game. There are a lot of potentially stupid actions I mulled over, thanks to meditation, before realizing they were not in my best interest, so I didn’t act on them. I am less likely to be impulsive then I was six months ago. This is important to note.2
(There is one decision I mulled over for months before finally acting on it. I know others would see it as detrimental to my well being but in the end, making that decision made me feel better and knowing its consequences may not ever be realized also help.3)
I asked my therapist what makes someone who has a mental illness different than someone who has healthy4 reactions to stressful things such as having low self-esteem or social anxiety. She said that’s a good question and after thinking about it for a few moments, her response was along the lines of someone who has a healthy relationship with stress is more prepared and better able to handle that stress where as someone who is mentally ill, the stress is heightened and we’re less likely to handle it in a healthy way.
The goal is not to get stable (because no one is really stable) or normal (no one is really normal) but to handle and prepare healthy responses to stressful things.
Which is where the meditation and gratitude come in. It’s all full circle.
xoxo,
Lisa
P.S. I highly recommend reading Zen Habits to get you started. You can also mediate using my favorite (and often my pushy instance of) app, Headspace.
1. I am not a doctor. I am not trained to dispense advice or consultation. If you’re mentally ill, think you’re mentally ill, or have additional questions about your mental health, please seek professional help.
2. TheExHusband often comments how I relate and respond to things is much better in the last 6 -9 months and a lot of that has to do with meditation.
3. Yes, I am being completely vague. No, I’m not going to tell you. No, it’s probably not what you think it is.
4. We kept saying “normal” instead of healthy and we air quoted “normal” every time we did so we decided that “healthy” (sans air quotes) was a better description.
Dear Internet,
Something we should all be doing is showing gratitude for what we have in our lives — it’s being thankful for what one has versus what one wants. Writing down gratitudes, privately in a journal or publicly on the interwebs, is an essential part of DBT and meditation as well as being really important for borderlines. Within the last week my DBT book and my mediation guru have suggested writing down one gratitude a day and at the end of week, ending the list with a total of 10.
Gratitudes and things that make me happy are a part of my carding coursework, and I track them everyday, so this should be easy to complete every week and obviously I’ll post them here every Sunday. (And I also acknowledge this is going to take me a few weeks to go beyond “I have killer hair.”) gratitude
My therapist for understanding
I am not physically ill
I have a large support network
I am tenacious
I have killer hair
I have a big heart
I try to do good things for others
People who have faith in me
happy
The smell and taste of pineapple juice
Trader Joe’s dark chocolate covered pretzels
The “Most Interesting Man in the World” commercials
Key & Peele shorts
Wearing my grey old man cardigan (I have two in separate styles)
Wearing my Black Phoenix Alchemy scents, especially Bliss
Dear Internet,
It’s been a busy week over here in Lisa-Universe. For starters, the written word pieces I mentioned a few weeks ago, published. The first piece, “How To Divorce Your Mother In Three Easy Steps,” is available over at WittyBitches.com. The piece proved to be pretty popular. Preen.
That was pretty exciting.
The second piece published, for No Flying, No Tights, is a review of a new manga series, Manga Classics, which specializes in classic books translated into visual prose. My first review, Manga Classics: Emma, is now up! I interviewed the author, Stacy King, yesterday (I’m currently transcribing a 45 minute video call into text. Oi!), which will be published sometime in the next few weeks. The nice thing about doing reviews of this calibre is the publisher is sending on books from the current collection for me to read and review. I adore that this job has a lot of perks.
This, of course, means I got to update my bibliography and resume. I’ve also added a few sample clips that I churned out this week for writing jobs. It’s nice to see published pieces from places that I do not own. This has been, in the writing world, a pretty awesome week.
♥♥♥♥♥♥♥
I’m on the East Coast now and have been for the last few weeks. The whole reason I am here is to go job hunting, which — isn’t happening. I’ve had nary an interview or even a phone call since I’ve been here; it’s incredibly frustrating. I’m forming plans, as I always do, but what I can tell you is I am mentally and emotionally exhausted. While I don’t necessarily feel as if I’m at the end of my rope, I do feel as if I’m running up against walls.
If it were not for the published pieces, I don’t know how I would feel.
In order to keep myself relevant, I’ve been teaching myself to code. I know, I know, I’ve been on the offense in regards to coding not the only thing in the tech world. But as more and more positions I’m interested in start to advertise they want coders of varying degrees, it was time to bit the bullet and get with the program.
I’m constructing my entire education around various coding classes I bought over at Stack Social and Udemy. I’m also looking into Code Academy for additional classes.
The thing that is having me chomping at the bit is where I’m located, there is nay a place for women coders to hang out. Interestingly there is very few social clubs for programmers as a whole. I’m only a short train ride away from NYC and yet this area is a wasteland. I’m working on finding online spaces for women to get together and that has also been slow going.
It’s all a wait and see game, one of which I have grown weary.
♥♥♥♥♥♥♥
In other good news, I took Jeeves in for an alignment this week and the wait was three hours longer than they had quoted me — so the manager gave me a MINI watch. With my MINI car collection (nearly a dozen and growing), my world domination of MINI is coming to fruition.
♥♥♥♥♥♥♥
Mentally? I’m doing – okay. Not 100% great but not down in the dumps either. I’ve long correlated my mania is a tip off of my hormones racing at the beginning of my period but this is one thing I find I cannot 100% control. Hell, even 50% control. My feelings of sadness, anxiety, and loss of overall control have very realistic seeds and I have to keep reminding myself of those things are natural, not disease based, things.
I’m seeing a therapist now and I have signed up with the local Depression Bipolar Support Alliance group, giving me a support system in place. I’m also mediating daily — I’m on a 37 day streak! But I still feel anxious most of the time, I’ve got a new fear of driving, which is apparently not unusual but it makes for interesting dichotomy in regards to the fact I’ve been driving for over 20 years, including several coast to coast trips. Why now? It’s a new thing, for sure, but why and what is what perplexes me.
Therapy better fucking help. I’ve got things to do.
The therapist and I talked about my hyper-sexuality and the coinciding factor I do not get a lot of pleasure out of the sex act itself. She pointed out, with my sexual history, by initiating and fucking someone first, I’m in control (as opposed to previous experiences where my control was taken from me). Once those words tumbled out of her mouth, suddenly everything clicked into place and I sighed a huge sigh of relief. I no longer had to be the goddess of fuck anymore — and that in and of itself is freeing.
xoxo,
Lisa
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Dear Internet,
I’m at Philly international airport on my way to my final destination and I’m debating the merits of being a woman who is about to start menstruating. I know my breasts are firmer and more round. I also know I’m throwing off pheromones like no one’s business because I have a crowd of gentlemen clustered me in this otherwise empty section of the airport. It could be my charm and wit, or it could be the Lisa-puffs, but I’m betting it is pheromones.
Today will be a long day. I drove 2 hours to the airport to catch an early afternoon flight to the east coast and now I’m on my layover in Philly before the final leg. There were plans to be had this evening, but I’m betting once I make it to my final destination, head will hit pillow and the drool will come forth.
I made an observation this afternoon while I played Tetris on my iPad, in that if I played the game deliberately, I could easily get to level 9, which is nearly a 100 rows. If I do not play deliberately, I am dead within the first 10 rows. I found this to be interesting.
But being deliberate about the game also meant I had to be patient. It also meant I had to focus on the game and not on what was happening around my world. Not too surprising, the more I put my energy into paying attention to the game rather than my usual mashing of buttons, I did really, really well.
This is similar to how meditation works. You concentrate on the body and then you open yourself up to the world to let it wash over you. Then you learn how to reign the focus back into yourself while the world is awash, so you can find stillness in the chaos.
Since being a good Tetris player requires much of the same philosophy, it makes sense to me that once I started putting my meditation practice to work in the game, my game got increasingly better.
Imagine if this was applied to everything?!
Interesting hypothesis, yes?
xoxo,
Lisa
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