Asking For -- And Accepting -- Help

It has only recently occurred to me how hard I have made my life by refusing to accept help when it is offered to me.  I have realized that over the years I usually take the hard, uncompromising road of doing it all by myself. Whether it was moving everything I owned alone – I have dragged a 100-pound handle-less trunk countless times across lawns on a blanket because I can’t lift it – or refusing the gift of a paid dinner from a friend, I have been ungrateful for the gifts that were offered to me in favor of being independent.

Don’t get me wrong; there’s a lot to be said for being able to do things on my own. At the same time, there is a lot more to be said about not holding myself back. Often, independence becomes a guise for shooting myself in the foot. If the answer comes to me in the form of someone offering me a break, there is no need to run the other direction.

Not only would I refuse help, I would run away from it. It’s not only ok to need help, it’s important to take it when it’s offered to me, because it shows I'm grateful for what I’m receiving. 

I am grateful for what I’ve received. I have found that the more I profess my gratitude, the more I realize I have to be grateful for. I am immensely grateful for the lessons learned, especially the ones that include being offered help, and taking it. Acceptance is worth a thousand words. Admitting that I am worth the help being offered – that I don’t actually have to do it alone – is worth a lot. 

I am not alone. I am surrounded by people who love and support me, and they are the ones I need to focus on, instead of the ones that I’ve let into my head to tell me that I’m doing everything wrong. Although those people are actual people I know, the conversations I have with them have never actually taken place. Instead, I have begun inviting in the actual conversations I’ve had: the ones where people tell me that I’m not alone, that I’m an inspiration even when I don’t feel like one; that I am unique, loved and that my dreams can become a reality. When I focus on those words, the entire world opens up to me. 

I will no longer leave the tools I find along the way behind, insisting that I must build them myself. I will no longer forgo shelter in the name of independence. I am grateful for the friends and family that have shown me such kindness, and I am ready to use it, just like any other tool, to make my path that much easier to forge.

Love and grateful kisses

Morgan

Sleeping on the Floor

When I can’t sleep for an extended amount of time, I get out of bed with my pillow and a blanket and lay down on the floor. It almost always works: regardless of how long I’ve been tossing and turning, moving to a different surface does the trick and I immediately fall asleep. After a couple hours – when my arm has gone numb or my back screams at me to wake up – I can haul myself up off the floor, get back into the bed and fall asleep with no problem at all.
Strange, I know. I don’t think that this trick has anything to do with my body craving hard surfaces. I think it has a lot more to do with removing myself from the space I was in and putting myself in a new space. Somehow the shift off the mattress works as a switch on my brain, and whatever it was that was keeping me awake – because obviously it wasn’t the bed – clicks off with the change of location.
You would think that knowing this would have changed how I handled other problems too, but that is not the case. You would think that I would be able to draw some parallels between being able to sleep on the floor and moving out of any other space that made me restless. You would think…and you would be wrong.
It has only recently occurred to me that the things that make me angry or hurt have everything to do with how I handle a situation and very little to do with who hurt me or made me angry. Basically, instead of shooing these people out the door, I could change the way I react to them, or * GASP * tell them how I feel and ask them to stop.
If this seems like a simple concept, you’re way ahead of me in the game of life. I have only just identified my ego as my biggest enemy, and for the first time in my life I actually get it when my dad tells me that you can’t change people, you can only change how you react to people.
But just because I get it doesn’t mean I can follow through with it, or I would be sleeping on my proverbial floor more often. If I got it completely, I would be able to demand more for myself, and stop trying to sell myself short. I would be able to ask for what I need instead of hoping others will recognize what I am worth and treat me accordingly. That approach hasn’t worked so far, so I think it’s time I try a different approach. So I’m getting out of the bed and choosing the hard uncomfortable floor to help flip the switch in my brain, the switch that says I’m not worth something unless someone else has noticed it and said so.
So, instead of waiting for someone else to notice how much I’m worth, I’m going to just tell him or her myself. Perhaps by doing this I can also convince myself that it’s true. Maybe, eventually, I will be able to start sleeping the bed again, because I will have moved it to a new, better, more restful, space.

Love and floored kisses
Morgan

Striving for Mindlessness

Since I finished my cookbook – really finished it: sent it to press, got a proof, made the order and began to sell it – I’ve been having wrestling matches in my head. My brain – all logic and no nonsense – has been keeping track of the ever-growing list of things to do to market the cookbook: finish the website, pre-sell books to local retailers, send press releases to local news media, etc. My mind, (I realize it’s a minute difference, but I’m going to call it my mind after reading an amazing book that changed my life called The Power of Now), on the other hand, has been trying to sabotage my brain at every step.

Here’s a typical conversation between my brain and my mind:

BRAIN: “Okay, today you’ve got to contact the people who you think will want to carry your book. Let’s make a list…”

MIND: (interrupts) “Make a list? What the f*ck is the point of making a list when there’s only one person on it, your MOM?” Who the f*ck else is going to want your mamby pamby book? You know anyone could have done it better than you could…it’s probably going to come back from the press with the cover on upside down…”

BRAIN: (quietly reciting the list in the background) “We should go to Wenatchee and see if anyone will carry it there, and oh, we need to remember to call Amazon to see if we can get it on there…”

MIND: (louder, angrier, pissed) “HEL-LO! ARE YOU LISTENING TO ME?!? YOU LOOK FAT IN THOSE PANTS!”

BRAIN: (stops dead)

MIND: “HA! GOTCHA WITH THAT ONE, DIDN”T I??? NEENER NEENER NEENER!”

BRAIN: (smirking, continues calmly) “Then we’ll start a Facebook page…”

MIND: “GAAAAAHHHH!”

Thankfully, I have been able to continue on with the lists and going through the motions to making my book a success despite all the doubts and my own attempts to self-sabotage. While I hope to one day get to the point where I can gag my mind and throw it in a dark room with no sunlight, at the moment I simply have to focus on taking the steps to get me there and hope it will shut the f*ck up.

With the realization that I self-sabotage, however, came the realization that there are many things I can do to stop it or make myself feel better. These are things that I’ve always done, but the difference now is that I do them to combat the feelings of failure or inadequacy instead of letting myself cycle into a deep, dark depressed mood. So, without further ado, my list:

1) COOK! Okay, I realize a lot of us (women especially) self-medicate with food, but there’s something incredibly soothing about actually making myself a meal before eating it to feel better.
2) Read. Having a good book to delve into, especially on my front porch, always takes the edge off.
3) Take a bath. With a book. And eucalyptus bath salts…
4) Go outside. Bikes rides, runs, kayaking trips, a walk…anything that remind me that it’s beautiful out there and out there no one cares if I’ve gotten anything done today.
5) Yoga. It makes my body feel better and always improves my mental state.
6) Call my friends. It’s nice to tell someone your darkest fears and have them remind you that they are all unfounded.

I told someone recently that I realized that most – if not all – of my problems are in my head, and that it both enlightened and depressed me. With that realization, however, came the realization that if the problems are in my mind, so are the solutions…if I can just shut my mind up long enough to find them.

Love and striving for mindless kisses
Morgan