chey being

For my untempered heart

Tag Archives: stress


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Embracing a Bad Day

I woke up yesterday morning not feeling the greatest.  I felt overwhelmed and underwhelmed with life all at the same time.  I am quite confident that anyone with a pulse has been there.  With so many projects in the works and not sure any of it is taking me anywhere, I felt stuck in the middle of a maze.  All of my passions seemed to have dwindled to a spark.  Everything felt very unimportant .  Is this it?  Does anything I’m doing mean anything?  Is this my life?  I was feeling pretty low.

Every time I think of writing about a “bad day,” I think twice and stop myself.  I don’t want to put that kind of energy out there.  I want my writing to have purpose, whether it is healing, thought-provoking, funny, or helpful in some way.  Often times, I will write when I am at my lowest of lows, but just for myself.  I get it out onto my computer and then I simply delete it.  It’s cathartic.  It gives me great comfort because I feel like I have unloaded my burden.  I  have learned the hard way that strong negative emotions are literally poison to my body.  I then feel clear-headed and can move on without all the exaggerated, heightened emotions and get back to reality…which is never that bad!

I think there is a fine line when putting myself out there.  These words we read on our glowing computer screens can often get lost in translation or completely misinterpreted.  They are without the inflection in my voice.  They are devoid of my enthusiasm or pain.  All I can do is hope I group a few of the right words in the right sequence to not only portray my thoughts but to give something.  Hope.  A smile.  A spark.  A knowing.  I want to give something other than the ramblings of my very bad day.

My life isn’t always pretty.  I’m not always pretty.  But I am too aware to get sucked in.  I will only allow myself to hang out at my pity party for so long before I must put on my big girl pants and bail.  Maybe I have to take another look at something from a different perspective.  Maybe I need to appreciate something at that moment that I have been neglecting.  Maybe I need to take action.  Maybe I need to do nothing but sit and find my peace.  Everything has purpose.  Everything has meaning.  I woke up with a self-defeating mind.  I sat around and did nothing.  I had no motivation and I felt really guilty about it.

Then I just embraced it.  I found my peace with all the things I didn’t want to feel and felt bad about feeling.  And when I did that…I actually felt better.

Oh, and today was a better day!  Have a fabulous weekend all!

 

 

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Signs, signs, everywhere signs.

For the past bunch of months, I have been meditating.  My brain, much like most I’m sure, runs on overdrive.  When I’m not organizing every minute of the day, I am problem solving.  It seems there is always something to “figure out.”   Whether it is something innocuous like, what color should I paint a room, to wondering what I’m going to do about my disintegrating marriage. My lack of self-trust can make every decision monumental.  Always, thinking, thinking, thinking and it’s exhausting!  Hence, mediation.  It has been wonderful, challenging, frustrating, and life changing.  And I’m only getting started!

Since I began,  I have been noticing more and more synchronicity within my life.  Another unexpected change is my sense or awareness to things around me.  Everything is energy and everything has a vibration; therefore, I imagine if I am more “in tune” with that energy or more aware, it makes sense that I would begin to have these feelings about what I thought to be inanimate objects.

imagesWhat is most powerful to me about these changes is that I am not only beginning to listen but that I am beginning to trust.     If I feel something, I just do it.  Ok, this is a work in progress, but the incredible thing is that I contemplate it less and then I actually take the action.  This is quite extraordinary for me because many, if not most of the time, I will question everything to death, thus talking myself right out of it.

For years now I have had an unusually strong feeling towards hawks.  Years ago when I was going through my divorce, I was looking in a particular neighborhood for a place to live.  I would often see a hawk flying around this area.  I can’t explain it but it always made me incredibly happy.  A deep within my soul happy, like my very insides smiled.  Yes, I always thought it was odd to get that excited about a bird but it was exactly how I felt.  It was like a feeling of seeing a giraffe on the side of the road.  That would be a WOW moment, right?  Only for me, it was a hawk.   I had never noticed hawks around this area before, which was only a few blocks from my marital home.  So every so often I would happen to take notice of this beautiful bird whether it was gliding through the sky or perched on a leafless tree branch.

A few days ago, I was driving home and thinking about the book I want to write.  I’ve had a general idea for some time now, but I knew it needed to have more of a central focus or purpose.  While I was driving the last mile home, this focus was coming to me.  It was all flooding in as if a bunch of jumbled numbers were beginning to make sense.  I began talking these ideas into the notes of my phone (because I was driving!!).  When I finished and was less than a block from my house, a huge hawk landed in the middle of the road, right in front of me.  I had never seen a hawk on the ground this close and could not believe how big it actually was.  I had to step on my brakes to avoid hitting it.  It landed, looked at me, realized I was too close and took off again.  It was magnificent.  I took it as a sign that I was on the right track.

indexNormally, I would not have connected the two.  I probably would have forgotten all about my notes or questioned them ad nauseam and let the whole thing sit on my phone until who knows when.

I was in my closet the other day and I felt or almost heard that it wanted to be painted; it felt depressing.  No, not because my wardrobe it slightly sad and boring (or maybe!).  I sort of sloughed it off thinking I DO NOT need to add to my To Do list right now!  I have been feeling very overwhelmed and when I do, I actually tend to add things to my list instead of drop.  I can not explain this behavior.  However, the thought stuck with me long enough to ask my husband what he thought.  He asked me why with his usual “ulterior motive” implication added.  I said that I didn’t know, I just feel it.  He told me that I did not need another thing to do, to which I agreed and dropped the whole thing.

A day or so later, I was running all over town looking for new kitchen rugs.  I was getting frustrated as I felt I was wasting so much time.  I was nearing Home Depot and asked aloud if I should stop.  I needed help and guidance so why not on where to get rugs?  I felt the answer was yes and so I went for it.  Disappointingly, I did not find the rugs I was looking for.  As I was trying to navigate my way out of the store, I wondered why I had felt drawn to stop here when I didn’t find my rugs!  I was walking through the middle “hall” and needed to pass through an aisle to get to the front of the store and out.  Each aisle was blocked with people or equipment and I had to keep walking further and further down.  Finally, I reached an open aisle and turned to walk up and out.  I quickly realized it was the paint aisle.  I knew I needed to buy paint.  With an unused store credit, I purchased my gallon of paint for less than $10 and left the store.

imagesIn the last two month I have been wanting to get a word tattoo on my wrist but I was waffling between a few choices.  While I was away in Costa Rica, we were all given a temporary tattoo to put on for fun and inspiration.  They were all laid out before us and I quickly knew which one I wanted.  It was the words “Surrender” in a perfect size for the back of my wrist.  This word, for me,  is almost laughable to anyone who knows me well because I am somewhat of a control freak.  I find it extremely difficult to surrender to anything!  So I lived with this word on my wrist for a few days and began to feel that this was the word for me.  Of course, in typical Chey fashion, I began to think about what everyone else would think and was beginning to question the whole idea.  I was struggling letting go of what others would think.  I had had oils on my wrists frequently causing the tattoo to become all cakey.  I went to the sink to wash it off so that it wouldn’t rub off on everything.  When I turned on the faucet, it shot water and air at me so hard that I jumped and screamed.  I knew that was my tattoo.

One may think it is all coincidence and maybe it is, but whatever it is, it allows me to feel connected to my true self, away from the self-defeating ego.  The beauty of it is that it is my reality, and thus that is my truth.  There can be nothing else.

imagesI write this to those who feel their chaotic mind is winning more often than not.  I write this to inspire one to meditate.  Maybe that mediation is taking a walk through the woods and listening to the sounds of nature.  Maybe that meditation is being in water, floating and allowing the sounds of life to be muffled away.  Or maybe it is finding a quiet space, sitting still, and listening to your breath.  I write this so that maybe someone will begin to listen to their inner voice that is desperately reaching out.  Unlike myself, I have stifled that inner voice for so long, making life much more complicated than it’s meant to be.

So, what is there to lose?

woman-meditating-beach


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What the bleep do I want?

The lovely, witty, funny, and talented  Amanda Insidethelifeofmoi allowed ME to write the following Guest Post for her hugely successful blog!  If your one of the few who are not already following her, please check her out!  Thanks again Amanda!

This may seem a bit selfish at first glance.  The “me, me, me,” of my inner two year old, but au contraire my darlings.  

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A good portion of my life has been spent reacting.  Something happens, big or small, and I am veered off in that direction.  I’m not talking about having an attention disorder or OCD, such as in a typical day of mine:   Making my way to the bathroom, spot a piece of lint on the carpet, must pick up.  Walk by the laundry room; should really stop and throw a load in.  Walk by the kitchen, “Did someone leave their plate out?”  Better clean that up.  The pillows on the couch are smooshed; must fluff!  Eventually my bladder says to me, “Hey lady, can we make it to the bathroom at some point here?”  Oh, right!

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I am talking about life on a grander scale, like those pesky things called relationships, careers, and dreams.  When we don’t know what we want in life, we simply follow along with whatever comes our way.  We may even have a muffled whisper deep down trying desperately to communicate with us, but we are too afraid to listen.  We may even make excuses like me, an expert at talking myself into anything!  Here are a few pernicious examples from my life:

1.  I really wanted to finish my Bachelor’s Degree in Communications.  I had made it so far but I had a fiance now and didn’t really need to work, so I quit.  I told myself I was tired of school and the money it cost would be a waste if I wasn’t going to get a job anyway.  Lazy ass.

2.  My inner voice, “You need to write.”  My all-controlling mind, “You should help your husband with his business and spend all day on the computer doing work you hate because at least you will be useful.”  How did I talk myself into that one?

3.  After my divorce, I told myself that I really wanted to be with someone who has the same spiritual views as me.  Met someone.  Did not have the same views.  Oh well…he gets along so great with my kids; it must be right!  Insert eye roll.

4.  Years ago, I had numerous “unexplainable” health issues.  I didn’t want to think or believe that it was my jacked-up life causing these problems, or my inner soul desperately sending me wake-up calls.  So I reacted to my body and  focused on 1. Freaking out and  2. Visiting every western and eastern medicine doctor within a 100 mile radius.

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There have often been times when I am so out-of-tune with myself that I was truly only reacting to life.  Almost hoping, waiting for something or someone to come along to fill the void and lead the way for me.

Years ago, I was asked by a well-known author and spiritual leader, “What is it you want my dear?”

“Ummm…,” I said, looking somewhat like a deer caught in head lights.  This was also in front of a large group of people which did not help in the least.  They all seemed to look at me, just waiting.  I could only imagine them thinking, “Who doesn’t know what they want? Loser.”

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He told me that we were going to take a break, I could think about it, and we would continue discussing it when we all returned.

I went back to my hotel room and thought about it.  I thought about it for so long and with no results, that I began to panic.  What was wrong with me?  I never did come up with an answer.  When we all reconvened and I had nothing of worthiness to report, I thought I sensed the questioner’s slight disappointment.  It was humiliating.  I felt like a total failure.

If we don’t know what we want, we will simply live a life of reaction to everything and everyone around us.  Every ache or pain will become our focus.  Every person that annoys us will distract us.  Every little blip in the road will be greeted with our undivided attention.  We will allow ourselves to be dragged into other people’s drama.  The options for distractions are endless.

How can we know what to do and where to go if we really have no idea what we truly want?

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At the beginning of the year, I had to make a change (remember that work I hated?), but I seriously had NO clue what to do!  I asked and I listened (OK, maybe I pleaded a bit) with no answer, but I decided that I had to have faith and believe that it would come.  And it did.  I wanted to teach Pilates and I wanted to finally sit down and write.  Within seven months, I completed my training and am now teaching.  I also started my blog….I am finally writing.

I have to be honest though, some of my “life diversions” have led me to grander things and seemed to have served some purpose to where I am now.  Maybe it’s more about knowing when to get off the path that has become too treacherous than getting on; however, I also think we often take the back winding country roads, when we could have taken the expressway.

Every day I am practicing to be aware and to “read the signs,” because they are there.  Life is speaking to us every moment in every way imaginable and unimaginable.  If we would only stop and listen.


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A Book Is All It Took

Fear Becomes Me, Part Two, is where I last left my story of divorce.  If I had to name the darkest hour of my life, it would be where I am now in my story.  The fear of being sick ruled my mind, and thus my life on every level.  It was a miserable existence and if not for my children, I am not sure I would be alive today.  To know that I allowed something, unwarranted no less, to rule my life really pisses me off, to be honest.  It was a waste of time and precious life, but I know too that it was uncontrollable at the time.  It directed my life onto a different path and for that part I am grateful.  My regret is that I stayed in that black hole for so long.

Every morning and every night I woke up unable to sleep, my first thought was always of what was wrong with me.  I went through this methodical process of trying to make sense of every symptom I was feeling, what could be causing it all and what action I should take to make it all go away.  Hundreds of times a day I would go through this cycle of thought.  My OCD tendencies that I would call mild, seemed to have grabbed hold of this new predicament and relished it like water to the desert.  It was a gloomy existence that turned to thoughts of wishing desperately that death would take me and release me from my prison sentence.  Each time I was in my car alone, I would sink into a space somewhere between peace and surrender, wishing that I would crash and all my pain inside and out would be instantly gone.

I believe somewhere deep deep inside, my suppressed soul was desperately trying to reach me.  My mother had recommended a book to me (which I’ve decided to keep anonymous).  Like all bits of hope thrown my way, I bee-lined to the book store.  And there I was, in the middle of the night, sleepless as usual, reading this book with a now common determination and desperation to find a solution, an answer, a cure, anything.  I was in a grim state during those early morning hours, tears kept welling up and spilling over every few minutes.  I was working myself into another frenzy, a borderline state of panic.   For an unknown reason, I stopped reading and turned to the back of the book.  I read something about contacting the author at an email address.

By this time, I was communicating again with James.  He knew on some minor level my fears, but I kept much of it inside.  I knew, like my husband, mother, and father, he could only take so much of my gloom and doom ramblings.  I had begun to become a phony to everyone now in my life, putting on a happy face for James when I was slowing rotting inside.  So when I read this invitation of sorts, I jumped at the chance to pour out my soul.  I don’t remember much of what I wrote that night, except that I was at a point where I was begging for death.  While fleeting, draining my mind of its poisonous thoughts was cathartic, even though I had no expectations of being heard.

Months later, while still on my miserable, lying, cheating, racked with fear path, I had a missed call and a message on my cell phone.  It was a woman who worked for the author and she wanted to know if I would like to be on his radio show.  I almost fell over.

Up Next:  The Invitation

This post is the continuation of my story and journey to divorce.   You can find my story from the beginning under the category, My Conscious Journey to Divorce.

 

Image credit: http://www.huffingtonpost.com

 


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Information overload?

Daily Prompt:  “Everybody gets so much information all day long that they lose their common sense.” — Gertrude Stein
Do you agree?

I think how one defines common sense will help determine a yes or no answer to this question.  Common sense could be what we have all been trained to think is common sense; therefore, what are we really losing that’s authentic to ourselves?  More information would just be adding to the pile that has already determined our common sense.  Is it common sense to quit the job you hate, but supplies a steady, secure income, to move to Key West and open your own food truck?  That would be nuts, right?  I don’t think so;  I would root for taking the chance on doing something someone loved any day.

The question also implies that too much information is bad.  I do agree that too much info can cause one to feel overloaded or overwhelmed, but ultimately, the more informed we are, the more educated human beings we are.  The trick is to truly know yourself so that one can quickly weed through the garbage and find what is or is not important.

The world is at our fingertips and will only continue to be more and more.  We have more choices because of the information out there.  We can choose to access that information or not.  No one is making us turn on that TV, or look at our phone every twenty seconds.  It can be somewhat of a test of will power.  A test that will determine, “What is important to me?”

My answer obviously would be no, I do not agree.  What I do agree with is that at some point this country will turn its focus onto how to manage all this information by creating balance.  We are a society buzzing with intensity of motion, someday our buzzers will grow weary.

 

 

 

 


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Fear Becomes Me, Part Two

[Here in my little not-so-private space, I have ever-so-slowly been sharing my story of divorce.  Part One left off with my husband’s discovery of my affair and my struggles with the stress of it all.]

I have spent a good amount of time on the St. Clair river.  Enormous freighters frequently pass through its deep blue water in a deceivingly effortless motion.  When the sun is shining on the wide river, the water is a transparent turquoise to rival any Caribbean sea.  The ships and boats that pass through create waves that bounce back and forth between the shores of the US and Canada.  They have nowhere to go thus creating huge waves in every direction with no rhyme or reason.  These menacing waves however, are no match for the giant metal barges.  At the front of the ships, the water swells to the big bullies in a continuous mound of crystal blue.  On most days, it can not win the fight.

This is how I felt back then, in a constant state of defense.  I was the water, feeling hopelessly pushed around with no control.  I was not deciding my fate, I was letting the situation rule my every move.

After years of secrets, there should have been some form of relief when my husband found out.  I’ve always heard that most people, deep down, want to be caught.  This seems ridiculous at first, but when thinking about the stress of it all, I can really begin to understand it.  However, there was no relief; the stress simply turned to, “How am I going to make this mess work?”  That is the only thought that crossed my mind.  I did not even think about divorce.  There was no love left, no anything left, but divorce did not cross my mind.  I had to continue to live a lie.  I had stopped the affair (for ever, I thought), but the mirage of being happy needed to continue.

So easily, I let my mind trick and suppress my soul.   I think sometimes that my very being had grown tired of me ignoring its warnings and just went into a deep dark corner where it waited in silence.

My mind continued to tell me that I could somehow make this work.  That I could somehow live a life with a man I did not want to be with.  It was around this time that the stress began take a toll on my body.   It began with numbness in my arms and legs,  then into the side of my face, followed by pins and needles in the hands and feet, and unexplainable pain in my arm.

One day early on, I was so afraid I was having a heart attack that I went to the ER.  The nurse there asked if MS ran in my family.  No, I said, but that simple little question set in motion 8 plus years of living in constant fear.  I was sent into full-out panic mode!  I went home and began reading all about MS on the internet.  Yeah, I know (now), BIG mistake!  I have to preface this story by saying that I am somewhat of a hypochondriac and this did not help my situation.

I began to breath fear.  I could not escape the worry that I may have some debilitating disease.  It consumed…every…thought. 

If I thought I was in hell before, this was a whole new kind of hell.  My life quickly became caught in a revolving door of doctors, specialists, herbalists, acupuncturists, psychics, you name it.  If I thought they could help me, I was going to try it.  The craziest part of all of this was that every test (and I had a lot of them), came back negative!  No one had any idea what was wrong with me.  Yet, I continued to search out new and better doctors.  I was happy with each negative test for about two minutes; they did nothing to suppress my fear because I still felt awful.  I would only think, “What if it just hasn’t shown up yet?”  It became my belief that somewhere, somehow, I was going to find the antidote to whatever the hell was wrong with me.

I had even succumbed to trying several anti-depressants.  Emphasis on the word, succombed, because I also have a fear of taking prescriptions.  I had so much anxiety about taking the drugs that it made me feel worse.  I also had so many side-effects to the drugs that were not working anyway, that I finally gave up.  I was going to have to suffer all on my own.

I was a tangled mess of desperation and fear.  I would have slaughtered a pig and painted myself with its blood if I thought it would heal me.

Sadly, actually pathetically, I never believed or thought that the massive amount of stress I was under had anything to do with my symptoms.  I never thought that my very life was becoming dependent on getting out of my current situation.

Up next:  A Book Is All It Took

This post is the continuation of my story and journey to divorce.   You can find my story from the beginning under the category, My Conscious Journey to Divorce.

 


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My moment to Shine..err..I mean, Whine.

Do you ever have one of those days when everything makes you want to cry, whine, or pout?  You’ve been warned.  (WAIT, don’t click that X!  The following is mostly tongue and cheek and meant to make you giggle.  I did not commit to a full-out bitch fest because no one enjoys that, so says my husband anyway.)

1. My son got snippy with me today. I honestly teared up.
2. The pharmacy wanted $102.00 for a prescription nose spray that was not covered by my insurance. NOSE SPRAY. $102, with a coupon mind you. Is there cocaine in this stuff? I wanted to cry.
3. The waitress at lunch today, whom I see all the time, acted like she didn’t know me. It hurt my feelings.
4. My internet was not working this morning. You would have thought my house was on fire! I didn’t handle it well. The only upside was that I was home alone. There are no witnesses.
5. I ate yet another Amy’s caramel chocolate nut something or other bar today. I am obsessed with chocolate these days (OK months, but who’s counting?) and I have no control over it. What is my problem? While training for my Barre Pilates certification, I have been exercising like Richard Simmon’s on crack for the last seven days straight! I have NOT lost any weight. I don’t need to lose weight, but I say this only to emphasize how much chocolate I have been eating!

The worst part of it all is I just want a free pass. Can’t women get a free pass once and awhile? I don’t know if it’s hormonal…Of course it’s hormonal! I’m a wonderful person! 😉 but, I literally do not feel in control of myself sometimes. My husband doesn’t believe in free passes, or hormones, or bitches can be moody sometimes (I’m joking people…laugh). My lovely spouse and I argued at lunch and sat in silence for most of it. So, needless to say, I would not recommend coming over for dinner this evening. I think I will lock myself in my room for the evening. I can do that, right? I wish. Mom’s can not do that. I’m pretty sure Moses wrote this in stone somewhere. We must put on our happy faces and frilly aprons and pretend. Pretend that everything is OK. Smile, you’re on camera (the children are the camera…in case you didn’t get that) Sigh.

Side note: As mentioned, I’ve been hard at work on my certification and now I’m taking off for 1/2 the month to hike in the mountains. It will be just me and my mom and maybe a few rattlesnakes. I have really missed reading and communicating with my favorite bloggers! Things will slow down towards the end of the month and I will be back again writing about all those happy topics, like divorce and sucky relationships 🙂 Or, if you don’t hear from me, I have fallen off a cliff and please send for help before the vultures get me or I have to amputate my own arm (was that too rough?). Sorry. I could never bring myself to watch that movie…now that was too rough!

 

Photo credit:  www.funnymisfit.com