I think my main achievement over the last week has been that I've started to focus on myself more, and started working more on accepting myself as I am, rather than criticising myself for not being who I think I should be.
Some examples are:
I'm not as fit and healthy and energy filled as I used to be. I've stopped berating myself for this. I'm doing the best I can, and looking after myself the best I can. I cancelled an outing today because I was tired - this is a good thing, rather than me forcing myself along with gallons of coffee and feeling even worse tomorrow.
My coping mechanisms are not healthy ones (see the above comment re coffee!). So I've written a list of my unhealthy coping habits and then another list of healthier ones to try to replace them with. So instead of forcing myself through the day today, I have had a nice bath, napped, meditated and done some yoga. My achievement is that I practised self care rather than forcing myself through the day and berating myself for not being able to do it
I do feel that I've managed to switch from focusing on friends who don't call to friends who do. It's really important to me to do that, and to recognise that my online friends (you guys) are just as important as real life friends - in some ways more, because I share more with you guys than I do with anyone else. Again, it's about shifting from what I think I should have or be doing, to focusing on what I'm actually doing and what I actually have. That feels like a big switch for me.
I have followed the acupuncturist's advice and written some affirmations. They are simple ones and I am finding that, if my brain is going into a negative whirl unnecessarily, refocusing on some positives about myself (I am a loving and creative individual. I am building a support network for my son. I am open to healthy and loving relationships) is helping me knock the unnecessary negativity out of the way. I am still not a fan of Law of Attraction/Mindfulness/your thoughts create your reality and so on, largely because, as I think we've talked about on here before, I feel in some cases it's used as victim blaming and just glosses over some very deep seated and serious issues. I do wonder if it's been Westernized and if aspects of deep introspection and self knowledge practised in other cultures have been reduced to something that fits into a meme or a slogan on a T shirt (I have the same issue with yoga classes that focus on the mat and the leggings rather than the calming aspects and health creating movements!). But anyway, I'm digressing, my achievement is that I'm picking out the bits that work for me and help and leaving behind the bits that don't.
I have moved away from worrying endlessly about son's educational situation. I'm going to keep chipping away at things a bit at a time and try to focus on what I learn along the way rather than having an end result in mind and then being disappointed when that doesn't happen. I think perhaps that's been my biggest problem with this move - in my head I saw son off at college, me back at work, socialising a lot, meeting a new man, visiting beautiful places, switching this horror house for a nice little cottage by the sea. And because that isn't what's happened, it's really knocked me. So I'm trying to focus more on what I'm doing, here and now, and not keeping on having a picture in my mind of what I think ought to be happening. That feels like an achievement of sorts.
So a funny mixture, a bit vague, I suppose, as they're things that aren't as easy for me to measure as getting the house clean or cutting the grass. But I feel like I'm in a pretty good place in myself right now. I think that's an achievement as well! Lol xx xx
