A different person?

I've heard it said many times: "I tell you what, I'm a different person to who I was ten years ago..."

I must admit, I never realized people actually meant it. I didn't grasp the extent to which it can be true. I was thinking back to the year 2000. I was 22, and I was planning my wedding. I was young, in love, naive, and content. I had no idea who I really was, no self awareness or identity. The toughest life moments were in my future. It was a carefree, trouble free life.

I've grown a lot since then. Experienced a heck of a lot, good and bad. I'm more aware. Ironically, I feel a lot less certain about my future. More lost in general. More disillusioned with life, love, and more unhappy and insecure. It's sad. I grieve for young and naive me. I'm sad her life hasn't turned out how she hoped and dreamed.

I know I'm capable though. In fact, I feel as though I'm on the precipice of good things. I feel like I'm learning major lessons and discovering things about myself that will change life again. No more waiting on some day. I'm grabbing my freedom and my willingness to learn and shoot forward and I'm going places. I create my own destiny and control my existence. These are exciting times. I'm not going to be under an illusion of happiness and freedom, like 22 year old Kelly. I'm actually going to BE happy and free. Truly.

I tell you what, I'm a different person to who I was ten years ago...

Me, Myself, I.

I am so self reflective at the moment. I'm reading books that are making me really reassess how I view myself, and what I want in life. I'm spending time trying to change my thought patterns. I'm having varying success. I have terrible esteem, and so far I have found that even when I am validated externally, it doesn't tend to have lasting impact. As cliched as it is, it really does need to come from me. And I'm not sure I know how to make that happen or if it is even possible. Living with self hatred though, is not really a viable option either.

I'm going to turn into a self help freak. HALP.

My Happiness

330am

There are still nights that I lay here awake, terrified mums cancer might return. I wonder does that ever pass?

Emotion

I have no emotional intelligence. If you've not heard of it, Emotional IQ can be measured, and whilst it's been some time since I tested, I ranked poorly then, and little has changed.

I've never been good at measuring and processing my emotions. I feel things so strongly, and it gets hard for me to react to them without allowing the feelings to take over. It can make life difficult at times.

In the past, this tendency to wear my emotions on my sleeve caused me no end of trouble when I was enduring infertility and all the emotions that go with it. I lost some friends because I would lash out when I was hurting. Thankfully, the friends that saw it through with me, knew why I lashed out, and didn't take it personally. They understood me. Those friends are invaluable, lifelong friends.

I'm thinking about this today because I am trying to temper some strong emotions at the moment. I've been hurt, and hurt makes me angry, as well as disappointed and protective. I must refrain from lashing out, I must temper the emotion. What do you do when someone has hurt you, fairly deliberately, and even though there is remorse, forgiveness is hard to find? It hurts, and I don't know where to put it.

Black blood

A droplet.

Of evil.

Trickles.

Winter

There is so much I love about Winter. Winter to me means hot chocolate, snuggly blankets, good books, and my favorite fashions (boots, scarves, hats...) Unfortunately, when it rolls around each year, I am reminded, that winter is.. well.. cold. REALLY cold. And here at the edge of the Great Dividing Range it's FREEZING. Well, as freezing as it gets without quite making snow. Shoosh. Whatever. I'm cold!

I'm also sick. I have the female version of man flu. I guess that'd be called woman flu, huh? I am whining and feeling very sorry for myself regularly. Still, despite all its flaws, winter is still my second favorite season after autumn. I have a box of hot chocolate. I have a slow cooker with a divine stew simmering on the stove, and seeing the naked trees through the foggy mist makes me smile. Nature is beautiful.

Am I alone in my winter love!?

Setting goals

Way back in 2008, before IVF brought me my darling RJ, I had some goals. I called it my post IVF dream-scape. I think it is time to revist those.

Travel remains a high priority. I have made progress on this, certainly, and intend to add Europe as soon as possible.

Writing also needs more work. I have progressed, but I need to commit to it regularly. Like a job, I can't just do it when the mood strikes (or it won't get done).

Returning to language lessons. this is still a strong desire. Italian, or French? Italian is my love (and likely my next travel destination) but Finn is learning French so that'd be cool, too. Thoughts?

Post grad study... I was doing teaching. I'm considering deferring for a bit whilst I decide what I want to do for sure.

Cameras - I have mums old DSLR which is pretty awesome. It has a crack on the lens, though, which in certain lights, puts a smudge on photos.

I could totally do the dark room thing in this house. There is a funny cupboard under the stairs that would be perfect, though it's not ventilated, I am certain it is workable. This is something to investigate ASAP. I would LOVE to develop photos of my own!

Added to this list is spending more time with the kids and with my friends. This makes me happy.

Living a dream

Eat, Pray, Love.
Bridges of Madison County.
How Stella got her Groove Back.
Julie and Julia.
Under the Tuscan Sun.

Just a few titles of movies about women having crises later in life. Uprooting their lives and doing something totally out of the norm. Maybe 33 is a little younger than the women in these plot-lines, but this is how I feel. I'm unhappy, restless, and trying to be positive. What I want is a total revamp. I want to live in Italy for a year, and write. I want to learn foreign languages and new skills. I want self discovery and experiences. It's obviously a common theme. I'm not alone, it's a rapidly growing topic in literature and film. Of course, that tends to be for those that take the leap and embrace the risk. I can't quite manage it, yet. Maybe that's why I am slightly below the usual age, I have to wait for the kids to grow up before I leap?

It makes sense that after broken relationships, and time spent on other people - children, family, etc. that women want to find themselves again. That they want to live a dream. What if you don't know what your dream is? How can you work toward it, then?

I can see how these films are successful. How exciting it would be to throw off the traditional, and the expected, and take a leap into something we all want to do, but few of us manage.

And, in the meantime, what do I do to fulfil the empty? To give myself a reason. To be ME. I keep travelling, I keep learning, and I keep striving to ignore that someday, and live in today. I work on what my dream is, I fine tune it, and I find ways to live it. Stubborn. Determined. I am rambling today. I'm not in a good state of mind. I am not happy, and I am not positive. Mostly, I feel lost. I guess my thoughts are too.

Choices

I spoke a lot last entry about choosing happiness in small things, and learning to live in the moment, rather than waiting for 'Some Day' to come. This morning I read a great article on exactly this. It is called: "7 reasons to be happy even if things are not perfect right now." It came from the Tiny Buddha website, a site which had me glued this morning to all kinds of brilliant articles after a friend linked a particularly relevant piece on facebook (Thanks Diane!)

It fits my current philosophy in life spot on at the moment. It's not an easy practice to engage in, but I can already feel the value in it. So, today I am enjoying the edamame and wine my BFF gifted me, the remaining glow of having babysat her twin boys last night, a peaceful afternoon with my kindle, and a feeling of contentment that right now, in this moment, I am doing my best to make what I can from life. It's been an extremely rough and traumatic week, and I've struggled to stay positive with some pretty serious hurt going on. Still, I'm determined to do my best.



Photo credit

Twit-piphany.

The other night I was doing my usual ramble of tweets on twitter about my life. I was feeling I had gone backwards, rather than forwards in the past 12 months, and felt lonely and sad. I then decided I needed a dose of perspective and reminded myself that actually, I have an awful lot in my life to be happy about. Health, the health of my family and friends, my children, writing, books, travel, and some of the most amazing friends you could find.

I am a self admitted control freak. I have to plan my life, I need to know what is coming, I rely on lists, and plans and organization for everything. I need to learn that sometimes, it's okay to NOT know. To have no plan. Seems obvious, right? not to this control freak it wasn't. I need to let go, and stop craning to see my future, and just be content to keep my head down and watch where each foot falls right now.

To just be.

I am starting to look for the happy in lifes small moments. Things such as no bills in the mail, a plan to see friends, an idea for my writing. These were my first three items for that day. The next, it was blackberry crunch muffins, pretty dresses and evil (in the best way!) friends.

Today, I am happy for warm clothes and heating on a freezing winters day, for my new kindle (and endless books!) and for hot meat pies.

Each day, I am going to tweet the 3 things that bring me a small dose of happiness every day. I am going to be more aware of these things so that I can begin to notice them more, so that I can enjoy every moment of my life, not just the someday's. I CHOOSE LIFE. I choose to live every day and find joy in it. This is my plan. I'll blog on it often. Join me if you will?

Where to start?

It's been a while since I blogged. A lot has happened. I went to America, I fell absolutely in love with New York City and had nowhere near enough time there. I enjoyed LA and I had a fabulous trip in general, but NYC was just head over heels love. I loved Broadway, and saw The Lion King which was brilliant. I loved 5th Avenue, I loved FAO Schwartz, I loved Central Park, I loved Times Square despite all the crushing people. There was so much more I wanted to do but didn't get time for, I'm so glad I decided to do that jaunt! Even the flight was interesting, flying over Colorado mountains and the Grand Canyon. It was really a good trip, and I came home planning to return, someday...

I was pretty homesick and missed the kids dreadfully, I got such a lovely welcome home from them though. So much love and cuddles. Beautiful.

The day after I got home, still jetlagged and out of it, we found my 15 year old and very first fur baby dead on the back deck. He was cold, and starting to stiffen, he'd been there a while. He was drooly and his bladder had emptied as well, so he was covered in ick, but I scooped his still body up and cried and held him anyway. He had been around since I was 18, since 1996, he was my baby. So many memories. He had such a personality. He would go nuts for eggs and - get this - low fat muffins. I don't know why but he LOVED those things and would stand on your head to get them! I was so grateful he had waited for me to get home before going. Seems silly, but a comforting thought anyway. I am sure that Hendrix will look after him. Losing two fur babies in one year has been really hard. Both were really special, and part of the family, they were pre kids, pre marriage... all my adult life. It has been tough. I miss them dreadfully. :(

I came home considering intermitting my uni studies as well. I'm not enjoying it, I feel at a point in life of readjustment. Like the world is my oyster and there for the taking... but how to do so? How do i want to? I want to travel more. I want to write... And I feel a strong need to just BE. To stop planning, stop controlling everything in my life and just roll with whatever comes my way. It's hard for a control freak to do that.

I have a writing idea simmering and I am excited about that, just waiting for it to develop itself into more than a vague rumination. it will come in time. I look forward to it. I want to use my spook...