Experiences

My (Super) Hero

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Birthday flowers above.

This weekend, I totally splurged in honor of my birthday and did something epic three days in a row. It kind of helped that the weather finally warmed up. I have counted less than 20 days since October 24, 2015 that I woke up and did NOT find snow on the ground, so the fact that we have been snow-less for almost a week now has really brightened my mood.

Perhaps the best thing I did over the past three days was to take myself to the movies to see Deadpool.

I have a new favorite super hero.

Daylight savings time this week has totally screwed with me, so I admit to being more sleepy and confused than normal; it took me awhile to realize the satire in the opening credits of the film (I won’t spoil it by giving you particulars). Not to mention, my autoimmune disorder that completely wrecks havoc with my sleep schedule has made it so that I am now awake at 4 am every day. I suppose this is an improvement from being awake from 2 am to 6 am, but still. If I’m awake at 4 am, I better be running a marathon, and in the case of the past week, I have been awake at 4 for health reasons having nothing to do with running.

In fact, my current sleep deprived and grumpy disposition is one of the reasons why I am singing the praises of the movie Deadpool like a hysterical teenager who has had too much Mountain Dew and Pop Rocks.

This flick mirrors my life and it does so in the most hilarious way.

I often try to make light of or joke about things because I am a big proponent of laughing and not crying. Sure, there are times to be serious. I am not a complete jerk. But we have to realize that sometimes you just have to laugh at yourself. Do not take life too seriously. No one gets out alive. Sometimes you need to laugh so that you do not cry. Laughing reminds us we are alive. It helps spread hope.

I am a Non-Hodgkin’s Lymphoma survivor, and now I have multiple food allergies, multiple medication allergies, and an autoimmune disorder. This is all adult-onset. When I first went into anaphylactic shock in my mid-20s, no one had any idea to what I was having a reaction, as I had no known allergies. I was not one of those kids who grew up with a food allergy. In the 80s? Food allergy? What’s that?

To make the situation even better, my allergies are so severe that I react by touch. A few years ago, when I was teaching pre-school, one of the students spilled their milk on me. Not only did I go into anaphylactic shock, but also I had multiple organs that started to fail and quite literally almost died. They may say, “don’t cry over spilled milk,” and in general, I would agree. I do not cry over spilled milk. I writhe in pain over it.

So the basic plot for Deadpool hit really close to home for me. Here is a man dying of cancer, and the cure leaves him with this awesome mutation that gives him all these super powers, but also results in this really horrible skin condition. He beats cancer (check), gets a skin condition (check), and has super powers in the form of healing (the reverse of my autoimmune disorder, but close enough, so check).

Deadpool spends most of the movie searching for Francis to “cure” him of the superpowers and skin condition much in the way I visit various specialists such as immunologists and dieticians to try to deal with my food allergies and autoimmune disorder. I have got to admit, that Deadpool does all this with a lot more style than I do. No wonder he has his own movie and I don’t.

I have a new favorite (super) hero. I wanna be, I wanna be, I wanna be like Deadpool.

This man’s sense of humor is incredible. If there was ever a person who can laugh over something instead of cry over it, then Deadpool is IT. In the super hero universe, Deadpool is refreshing. Each super hero has their own hard luck story that they have overcome to be this incredible person. Superman’s planet blows up, Batman’s parents get killed, and Spiderman gets bit by this freaky-ass spider, Deadpool gets cancer. Superman is mysterious, Batman is broody, and Spiderman is a little ADHD for me. Deadpool is a breath of fresh air.

The man tells it like it is. When you have some major disease or chronic disorder, people whisper about it. It is not “appropriate” to talk about. Deadpool has no filters. The movie had me in stitches the entire time so much so that I completely forgot I have an autoimmune disorder making my life hell for the 2 hours I was in the theatre. That is no small feat. Like the movie, my autoimmune disorder involves a skin disorder also, so I see my disease every day. Until I am healed and done with this episode I am having, it is continuously in my face, for me, and the rest of the world, to see.

I enjoyed this movie so much that I want to see it again. For the record, there has only been one movie in my lifetime that I have actually paid to see twice in the movie theatre. That movie was the Beatles musical Across The Universe. If Deadpool is still around on my next day off, then this flick could be the second film I pay to see twice in a theatre. We will see how much longer it plays.

I have a new (super) hero.

 

Freedom at Forty Plan

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Adventure. Romance. Intrigue. These are the thoughts that come to mind when dreaming about world travel – whether backpacking through Europe, hiking through the Amazon, or braving the bone-chilling cold of the tundra to the north. These are the type of experiences that we typically have in our 20s, that decade full of existential crises in which we strive to identify who we really are and where we belong. Have your fun while you are young, because then it is time to settle down and be responsible.

Baloney. I, for one, have never done anything at the so-called developmentally appropriate time. While most people complete their bachelor degree in four or five years, I spent 15 years completing mine, fighting homelessness, illness, and trying to forge my way through the unknown forest of academia without enough social capital to weather the storm. At 36, I tell everyone I encounter that life is so much better this side of 30. I fought many battles and demons throughout my 20s and would not go back even if you paid me.

So while many people may have had the privilege of having a “gap year” or being able to travel extensively worldwide in their youth, I did not. It’s a little hard to contemplate world travel when you are trying to figure out how to get yourself to work everyday, hoping that you have a functioning vehicle and enough gas money to navigate the 12 miles between home and employment.

When I say that life is so much better on this side of 30, I truly mean it. In my 30s, I have finally grown comfortable in my own skin, I have figured out how to adult (sort of),  I finally completed not only my bachelor degree, but also graduate school, and have been able to meet life’s challenges and obligations with more confidence and grace than I ever had in my 20s. While many people may have getting a stamp in their passport as an item to be completed on their bucket list before the age of 30, I have get a stamp in my passport on my bucket list for age 40. If you haven’t noticed, for all my degrees and intelligence, I’m a little slow on the uptake on some things.

Here launches the Freedom at Forty Plan. As I approach my 37th birthday, I am looking at about 37 months to prepare to make this happen. I already have a passport. I ran a marathon in Canada right after the regulations tightened that required a passport for entry to and from Canada, before the invention of enhanced driver’s licenses for those living in border states. As many times as I have used my passport to go between Canada and USA over the years, Canada never stamps it. Plus, in my book, Canada doesn’t count. It’s our neighbor right next door. I’m looking for Adventure with a capital A.

While I have always had this dream of backpacking through Europe, it has been a rather big, daunting, and vague goal. I decided that if I am truly going to make this dream a reality, that I better pick a location, a date, and start planning and saving to make the trip happen. I chose my 40th birthday because I feel like I want to do something big to commemorate the passage from my 30s to my 40s since my 30s have been so significant, and frankly, the best decade of my life. When I go from 39 to 40, I want to do it with a bang. Practically, this also gives me about three years to try to save the money for a large trip. Unfortunately, I am not one of those people with a safety net or a strong support network, so I have to do everything on my own, and I have to work for everything I want. If I want to travel internationally, then that money is going to have to come out of my own hard earned paychecks and have to be squeezed somehow out of an already tight budget.

I began by researching airfare, so that I could get an idea of how much money I need to try to hoard over the next few years. Even after checking multiple cities in multiple locations, I have decided that Europe is way too expensive for someone with my income to be able to afford. Also, if this is going to be the first true week long vacation of my life (and it is), then I have ideas on what I want to be able to do during that week in a particular location.

I want to go surfing. It’s been years since I have been able to go ocean surfing. The past year or so, I have been landlocked to the Great Lakes. I want the big waves. While the Atlantic has been okay the past few years, it does not live up to my time on the Pacific Ocean. Plus, there are other oceans and waters that I have yet to surf.

With all the research I have done on airfare, activities, culture, and safety, I have settled on Nicaragua. Nicaragua has the beaches and is a great surfing destination. I also plan on going volcano boarding. Nica is the only place in the entire world where you can go volcano boarding. If I am going to spend money on international travel, I am going to do it all.

I am calling this my Freedom at Forty Plan, because I have sacrificed so much of myself, my relationships, and my life in the pursuit of my education, that I am now free to do whatever I want to do. I am no longer confined to a semester schedule or a particular geographic location due to classes. At forty, I will finally have the freedom to travel internationally, as I have so longed to do for many years, and hopefully attain that feeling of adventure, romance, and intrigue that I seek.

In addition to having three years to save, I also have three years to learn Spanish (again). Spanish is my fourth language, and I have not retained it, as it has proved to be the most useless of my four languages (probably hard to believe, but it’s true). While I am sure that it is probably possible to get around Central America without Spanish, I believe in being a respectful guest if I am going to visit someone else’s country. I also believe that knowing the language will empower me so that I am able to better keep myself safe (multiple food allergies remember – I don’t want to get caught in a major medical emergency in a country where I don’t speak the language), and better able to fully immerse myself in the culture and interact with the people in ways that is going to make this one of the most memorable experiences of my life.

If people do not travel in there 20s, or even if they do, most people envision being able to travel while in retirement. I want to travel as soon as possible while I can fully enjoy the experience. With all due respect, as I’m sure that there are octogenarians who do, but I do not personally envision myself still surfing in my 80s. Running marathons, maybe, but probably not still surfing.

That said, in addition to my Freedom at Forty Plan, I am also thinking about my retirement from the workforce in about 30 years or so. I have joked that I will be working until I die, but honestly, I don’t want to do that. I want to retire from the workforce and be able to enjoy life. So while I am trying to save for my Nicaragua trip, I am also trying to save for retirement. Again, I never do anything at the correct “developmental time.” I realize that I should have started saving for retirement when I started working 20 years ago, but life circumstances just did not lend itself to that reality.

I am also taking this trip to Nicaragua trying to figure out where I want to retire. I have already decided I am not going to stay in my current location. For one, I don’t want to be here that long term, and second, I can barely afford to live in my current location on my current salary; if my earnings are reduced in retirement, I definitely have to relocate.

Nicaragua will complete my bucket list item of having a stamp in my passport by age 40, and will hopefully be one of the more remarkable experiences of my lifetime. I also plan on going with the vision of retirement. In my research, I have discovered that it is sometimes cheaper to expatriate and retire in other countries than it is in the USA due to lower costs of living. Nicaragua has generous visa requirements for ex-pats from USA and Canada. Central America is one of two locations that I am seriously considering for that time when I decide to leave the workforce.

Freedom at Forty is a lovely three-year plan that may or may not also fit into my long-term life plan. If I decide not to expatriate, then I have lost nothing. I have completed my goal of international travel and I’m sure will have a phenomenal vacation. Yet, Nicaragua could also be a location where I decide to retire. I haven’t decided yet. I have 30 years to go before I get there. I’m just trying to keep all of my options open.

Adventure, romance, intrigue. My time is coming. Now that I have a location and dates planned, the hard part comes of pinching pennies, making good choices, and trying to live life while saving for my future. It may not be backpacking through Europe as I imagined, but I am sure that I am going to have the time of my life. I spent 20 years in college, working on one degree after another. Now, it is time to spend the next three years of my life trying to check an item off my bucket list.

My retirement from my career as a professional college student has truly given me the freedom to be the captain and navigate my own life unconstrained by the linear goal of achieving an education. I have many goals in life and many items on my bucket list. Freedom at Forty is just the beginning. Graduation from graduate school was not an ending; it is the beginning of the rest of my life.

For Better or For Worse

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Many people today seem to stick around for the better and disappear at the worst. They say to truly find out who your friends are: screw up and see who is still there for you. Then, there are the people who are there for you when you are down but leave when you are up because they enjoy wallowing in misery and simply cannot stand to see other people happy.

While earlier generations seemed to embrace the for-better-or-for-worse notion more whole-heartedly than our own, it is an important concept to apply to all areas of life, from relationships to hobbies to passion.

After spending almost four months on the waiting list for the oh-so-popular Big Magic by Elizabeth Gilbert, it has finally been my turn to have the novel out of the library. I have spent those past four months reading reviews and blogs of people not only mentioning the book but also downright gushing over it.

I finally read the book, and while it is certainly not my favorite, I stuck through the entire novel, for better or for worse, and read the entire thing. There were times in the beginning of the book where I almost put it down and stopped reading because it was not interesting to me, but I thought that there has to be some reason why this novel is now so wildly popular, and I was determined to find out why.

So I stuck through the worst part of the book, and it finally did get better. About the last 100 pages of the novel were okay. Perhaps the idea that stuck with me the most, simply because it so clearly articulated an idea that I have been struggling to find words to describe over the past 20 years has been the idea of the Shit Sandwich.

That’s right, Shit Sandwich.

According to Gilbert, the essence of shit sandwich in a nut shell can be boiled down to how much suffering you are able to endure in order to achieve what you love. Of course, this is an extreme simplification of the concept, and if you would like to have a more elegant explanation, then you simply have to read the book. The pages explaining shit sandwich were probably the most profound part of the novel for me, and I could personally leave much of the rest. Basically, the concept of for-better-or-for-worse applied to all areas of your life, not just a marriage ceremony or some other type of elaborate rite of passage.

I had a brief moment of weakness a few weeks ago when the reality of being retired from spending 20 years as a professional college student finally set in and I completely panicked. It was something like a baby who did not want to be born but wanted to return to the womb. I sat there pleading and plotting about how to return to school, and what type of degree I wanted next. I sat there and thought that before completing my psychology degree, I had started a physics degree. I spent three years as a physics major before deciding, after taking calculus 1,2,3,4 and differential equations, that I had had enough of math and did not want the physics degree anymore.

I was not prepared to eat the shit sandwich that accompanied pursuit of a physics degree. I was in physics for the better portion. I love astronomy and motion and dynamics, and particle physics. However, I was not able to deal with the for worse portion of having another four advanced math classes to take after the five I had just completely suffered through.

I then decided that I could not go back to school to finish the physics degree. Not only am I not committed to eating the shit sandwich, but I also already have four degrees, and while I would not trade any of the degrees or any moment I spent working on obtaining them for the world, I do not, in fact, wish to relive that portion of my life. That is simply not my flavor of sandwich.

But now that I personally grasped the notion of for-better-for-worse and read about shit sandwiches, I started to apply that idea to other areas of my life. For example, I am not a morning person. Pretty much everyone who knows me in real life knows better than to wake me up in the morning. I am a night owl and always have been. I have spent over a decade on either second or third shift; the few brief years I did have a day job was hell on earth for me. I am just not a day person.

However, I have absolutely no problem getting up at 4:30 am and spending hours preparing for and running a marathon. When it comes to running, the shit sandwich that is getting up at 4:30 am is something that I am not only willing to eat gleefully, but also has me coming back for more. There is no other aspect in my life in which I am willing to eat the shit sandwich of 4:30 am, but for running, I am.

You see, running and I have this special relationship. I will wake up at 4:30 am. I will run in the rain, the snow, the cold, and the heat. I will run when it’s hard. I will run when it’s easy. I am in love with running, and over the years, I have definitely been able to take the good with the bad.

Once I found degree programs that were the right fit for me, I did the same with school. I spent years only sleeping from 2am-6am to ensure that I was able to complete all my schoolwork in addition to piecing together multiple jobs to make ends meet. I sacrificed many relationships and much leisure time in my pursuit of education. I swallowed that shit sandwich hook, line, and sinker for 20 years.

The significance of reading Gilbert’s Big Magic for me was the realization that now I am in retirement, I have the option of choosing what flavor of shit sandwich I want to eat next. I have been trying to figure out what to do with the ridiculous amount of time I now have on my hands since I am no longer working 70 hours a week and trying to be a full-time grad student.

I have been trying to decide what type of activities I want in my life. Do I want to join a club? Do I want to volunteer my time? With each option I have considered, I have begun to think of what flavor shit sandwich I want to eat. Now that my time is my own, I am less likely to eat shit sandwiches than I have before. Call it growing up, call it privilege, but I have found myself deeply protective of my newfound time.

What new activity do I want to try for better or for worse? Where am I willing to put my time? I have no problem with failure. It is possible I will decide on a volunteer opportunity and then discover that I am not prepared for that shit sandwich. That is fine. I will find another activity. However, I am trying to make an informed decision on how to not only enrich my own life but also enrich those around me.

Now that my time is my own, how do I want to fill those hours? What fills me with so much passion that it will endure for-better-or-for-worse? As we slow down our lives, this is the type of first-world problem we create. How best to spend our leisure time to ensure that our time is exactly that – leisure. It’s a wonderful problem to have.

When we identify that which we are able to live with for-better-or-for worse, not only do we make ourselves happy, but also we increase the love that is in the world. Relationships, activities, places, employment are all areas of life in which we can apply the for-better-or-for-worse principal. When we identify the areas that we are able to make that commitment, not only does it make the shit sandwich palatable, it also makes it almost delicious.

The people, activities, and relationships that stay in our lives for-better-or-for-worse are those that will likely last a lifetime. I don’t know about you, but that is the type of Big Magic I want to have in my life.

 

 

 

 

My Favorite Things

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This morning I am waiting for coffee to brew so that I can put it into one of my favorite coffee mugs, flavor with my favorite coconut milk creamer, and have a leisurely morning warming up for the day listening to some of my favorite CDs. Christmas made me realize that I am very fortunate in my journey towards minimalism in that I am now surrounded by my favorite things and use them on a daily basis.

What is in my life brings me joy.

I came to realize that this week as everyone around me was running around hurried over the Christmas season, and I was just kind of there – relaxed. My big success this season was being able to downsize Christmas from three boxes to one. This is not meant to be a la Scrooge or Grinch-like. I am now surrounded by only my most favorite and meaningful Christmas decorations. Some of the things that said goodbye from the 2 boxes now gone include items such as a string of lights on which only half the bulbs work, some large and heavy clay ornaments that only served to weigh the tree branches down to the point of being unsightly instead of decorative, and the Christmas tree skirt that shows every snag and cat hair.

This year, I enjoyed the holidays with working lights everywhere, ornaments on the tree that were beautiful and meaningful, and music that filled my heart and lifted my spirits. When I had a glass of wine this week, it was in one of my favorite wine glasses that had previously sat in the back of the cupboard – because it was a “favorite” glass it simply sat unused. Why shouldn’t my favorite glass be used as everyday-wear? For what special occasion was I saving it? Life is a special occasion. We are on this earth for a limited time, and the time to enjoy what makes us happy is now.

As I had extra time off from work for the holiday and was home, I also added a few items to the general donation box that was not associated with the Christmas purging. As I looked at the donation box and moved it from one part of the room to another, I thought: “If I were moving, would I want to deal with this box? Would I want to carry it and load it into a truck and unload and unpack it?” Looking at the items in the box, the answer was no. I am so glad to be getting rid of the items in the donation box so they do not weigh me down both literally and metaphorically.

I’ve been on this minimalist journey for about 4 years now, and while the outflow has slowed, it does still continue. I never know what I am going to find where, and be able to take the critical eye over items deciding on whether they are useful or bring me joy.

The upside to the stream out slowing to a trickle means that, for the most part, my favorite things surround me. My goal is to be surrounded only by what I find useful or by that which I love. Life is to short to waste not only on the accumulation of needless and useless crap, but also life is too short to waste on that stuff’s storage, maintenance, and upkeep. As a result of removing the unnecessary, my holidays have been filled with peace. Peace not bought in a store. In fact, this peace has been acquired by actively avoiding the store and removing things I never should have bought in the store in the first place.

As I sit here looking at the favorite mug that was always in the back of the cupboard because it was “the favorite,” I realize that the time is now. The time to use your favorite things is now. The time for happiness is now. The time to do and say all those things you wanted to do and say is now. Life is very short.

Do your favorite things surround you? Does it bring you joy? If not, what do you think about removing the unnecessary so that which you truly love has the opportunity to shine?

 

 

Time is a Gift

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I’m not going to lie. The past month (the first month) of my retirement has been wicked hard. No matter how much I giddily anticipated the slow down, transitions never quite go as planned. As mentioned in an earlier post, my life did not just slow down. It came to a screeching halt.

As painful as that transition was, it served as a wake up call. I definitely got a reality check. I have always thought of time as a commodity. I have never valued my time. My time has always been bought, bartered, or sold, and it has never been my own. In the past few weeks that my life has slowed down, my time has been my own. When you are so busy going from one thing to another, you never have time to think. When your life slows down to a point where you once again retain ownership over your time, it can be an uncomfortable process if you are not used to having time on your hands and are unsure of how to handle this newfound gift.

Old coping skills die-hard. My first thought, in a moment of panic, was that I have to go back to school. I need a fifth degree. I don’t know from where or in what, but I need another degree. Then, I was able to stand back and ask myself, “Do I really want to go back to school?” The answer is no. Twenty years of college was enough.

This transition probably would have been easier on me if it had occurred at another time of year. In spring and summer, my life is full of outdoor activities such as running, surfing, and spending time at the parks. In the winter, I have a tendency to hibernate. While I have plenty of things to do and plenty of ways to entertain myself and stimulate my brain, what I lack is human interaction.

The biggest benefit to slowing your life down is that not only does it leave you with more time on your hands, but also gives you the power to control what you do with your free time. Once I determined that I do NOT, in fact, want to return to school, I asked myself what I do want to do.

I came up with some ideas.

Some of those ideas I decided I do not want to do right now, but in the fall. Some of those ideas I decided were more of a time commitment that I am willing to give right now. While I need human interaction, I do not want to trade school for some other all-consuming activity. I want my time to be my own.

I have identified two activities that I want to do that seem to require a level of time commitment with which I am comfortable. After the holidays, I plan on putting my plan into place to engage in the two activities and hope to pull myself out of the rut into which I have fallen.

I have checked into many different volunteer opportunities with a great many deserving entities. While I would love to help them all, I simply cannot. The beauty of having time on my hands is that I get to choose what to do with my time. Time on my hands is not only a gift to me, but also what I choose to do with the time I have been given can also be a gift to others.

Part of my intention in slowing down my life is to identify what is important and what is not and to be able to focus my energies on the important things. Life is too important not to do so. Time is a gift and not a commodity has been a very challenging but very deserving lesson I have been learning the past few weeks.

Do you view your time as a commodity? Are you constantly working just to get ahead when really, it would mean so much more to your family if you could come home even an hour earlier one day? At the holidays, we purposefully take the extra time to spend with family and friends and to engage in activities that bring us joy.

We should be doing that all year round, not just at the holidays. Time is a gift both to you and to others. Take this time of year as an example of how much joy could be in your life year round if you only view time as a gift and not as a commodity. We have so much when we rewind real slow.

 

120 to zero

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Zero to 60 sounds so sexy when you think of a V8 engine with synchronized 6-speed shifting under the hood of some hot ‘vette with the top down on a sunny day. Every once in a while, we all feel the need for speed, however that may manifest. Sometimes it’s the feeling of pedaling superfast on your bike like you were a kid and letting go of the handle bars. Sometimes it’s trying to run super fast and get under a 6-minute mile. 0 to 60 takes on different meanings for everyone, but always results in excitement.

120 to zero does not elicit the same thrill. It is pretty much the equivalent of hitting a brick wall. No one wants to be a crash test dummy. Unless you are talking about the band, they are pretty cool. My personal favorite is Afternoons and Coffee spoons. I digress. When slowing down, the key is to slow down slowly, not to come to an abrupt halt. It is true in traffic as well as in life.

I feel as if I have gone from 120 to zero in the past month. My purpose in retiring from 20 years as a college student was to do so gradually so that I could adjust to the change without instigating any sort of crisis – midlife or otherwise. Slowing down slowly did not happen as I envisioned. Once I completed my master’s degree, my life came to a very abrupt halt.

The first few weeks were not too bad. It was similar to being on school break such as the winter break for the holidays or even summer. However, now reality has set in, and I am not really sure what to do with myself. The change in seasons is not helpful. At least in summer, I had the parks and the beaches. I took my schoolwork with me as a necessary evil, but I certainly had plenty to do between leisure reading, my surfboard, a Frisbee, and a few other beach toys. In winter, things are much more dismal.

With the exception of the past week, we have had snow on the ground pretty much every single morning since mid-October. We haven’t even hit New Year’s yet, and I am already going stir-crazy with cabin fever and frustrated with my lack of a game plan. Oh, sure, I now have plenty of time to get caught up on leisure reading and to binge watch certain shows I have checked out of the library on DVD. While I have plenty of things to do, I feel like my life is going nowhere fast. I have hit a brick wall.

This was not my purpose. My purpose was to slow down gradually, not come to an abrupt halt. All of my social interactions were school related, and my phone never rings or dings anymore. If I am not in school, it’s like I don’t exist and no one bothers to talk to me. Quite frankly, it’s probably just as well. A big part of the reason why I have not been online much is that I have nothing to say.

While 120 to zero was not my intent, it is my reality. Now I have to figure out how to pick up the pieces and move on. Abrupt halt to my social and intellectual life was not something I wanted.

People say I should get a hobby. I have plenty of hobbies. What I lack is something to give me meaning, and people with whom to interact. I am not sure how to fix those challenges.

Have you ever had an abrupt change? Even when you see something coming and feel you have planned so well, have you had something happen that completely sideswiped you in a way you could never anticipate? Zero to 60 is exiting. 120 to zero is hard. Hopefully I will find a way to turn this around into something more exciting. When one door closes, another one opens. Right?

Maybe not.

Enjoy without owning

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My library card gets a voracious workout. Now that I have officially retired from a 20-year career as a professional college student, my library card is starting to rival a heavyweight champion. I am very fortunate to live in an area with a well-stocked library that also has an impeccably organized inter-library loan system to be able to get virtually any item I may desire. From books to DVDs to music CDs, I can check out pretty much all forms of media and entertainment you could possibly imagine.

The joy in this is that I am able to continuously feed my mind without my wallet getting thinner. Libraries are free. If I were to purchase everything I have recently checked out of the library instead of borrowed it, I would need to buy stock in Amazon or Barnes & Noble, as the tally for my mental stimulation is staggering.

I have gotten so much enjoyment over certain books or movies that I have checked out of the library lately that I have put some of those items on my Amazon wish list. Then, I noticed the tally on my wish list and realized I need to slow down. Way down. Just because I enjoy something does not mean I need to own it.

If you enjoy something you have read once, how likely are you to read it again? I do have some novels on my bookshelf that I will re-read continuously because I enjoy them that much. Many of my novels I do not re-read, even though I enjoyed them immensely the first time through. This is why my barometer for purchasing an items is often “if I have checked it out of the library 2-3 times, then I need to own that item.” Lately, I have caught myself putting items on my wish list after only one go-around.

Realizing what I was doing, I went through my wish list and deleted items that I have only read or watched one time. Sure, I enjoyed it the first time I read or watched it, but did I enjoy it enough that I will probably want to revisit that item multiple times? Probably not. I simply got caught up in the holiday flurry of making a wish list for items that you want-but-don’t-need.

Over the past few years, I have been working on curating the movies and novels in my house so that my collection is housing well-loved items that I will visit time and again. There is no need to have to dust, store, and take care of items you are not using or that do not bring you joy more than once.

Using my library card instead of purchasing every item on my wish list ensures that my house only contains items I truly love. It also helps to be sure that my budget stays on track and that my money is being allocated to expenses that truly need to be met and is not spent frivolously on wants. Money saved on books and DVDs on my wish list is money that can be used to fund experiences – so that I have moments with friends in which I can make memories that last a lifetime.

How does enjoying without owning increase your happiness? Do you have more time for family because you spend less time cleaning? Do you save the money you would have spent on an Amazon wish list and use it to take a vacation instead? Enjoying without owning helps to reduce the clutter in our homes and frees our time for things most important in life – memories and experiences.

 

 

The Most Wonderful

/ rachelgoes262 / Leave a comment

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I have never understood why we need a holiday to be thankful. We should be thankful everyday. After witnessing some of the tragedies caused by the gluttony of capitalism today for Black Friday, I am thinking that perhaps the reason why we have Thanksgiving is that people so quickly forget to be thankful. They need a reminder. It’s a little sad that they so quickly forget the lesson the day after, but still. We need a Thanksgiving to remember to slow down and pay attention to what matters.

There is always something to be thankful for. Perhaps the most important are family and friends. That is the part I love most about the holiday season. The holidays are supposed to be that time of year when we hunker down amidst the falling snow to spend quality time with the ones we love. Holidays are not supposed to be about shopping and gifts and getting the best deals.

You can go out right now and max out some credit cards buying the best gifts. On Christmas, the recipients will squeal with delight, probably forget the gift in 5 minutes time once they open another, and then you spend the month of January and the first part of the new year working extra hours trying to pay off that credit card bill that brought only a few moments of fleeting happiness to your life on one day of the year. That is pretty much what every red-blooded American does this time of year.

Wouldn’t you most rather spend the time inside playing games with your children, drinking hot chocolate with your spouse and watching the snow? Children grow so quickly. The best gift you can give them is your time. Sure, that new 4-wheeler or other large ticket gift may be great, but it is more fun if they have time with you to enjoy. The holidays are supposed to be about peace and remembering to slow down to enjoy the people in your life. Instead, American consumerism has made it all about things.

I put up the Christmas tree today, and was a little sad that there are no gifts under it. All of the presents I am purchasing this year are either consumables (wine, chocolates, gourmet coffees, etc.) or experiences (movie theatre gift cards, rounds of golf, etc.). No presents kind of makes a Christmas tree a moot point. However, when I thought more, I remembered that the presents are not important. What is important is the fact that my cats love it when there are no presents under the tree because they enjoy curling up under it and sleeping. What matters is that I love turning off all the house lights to be able to view the tree lights while listening to holiday music from my youth, and enjoying someone’s company.

What makes this the most wonderful time of the year is the peace and joy that comes from having friends and family in our lives that make the world that much richer. People and experiences are the true measure of wealth, not how big of a TV you own, or how many vehicles are parked in the garage.

In the flurry of holiday activity, be sure to take some time between the parties and the shopping to remember the true meaning of the season. Be thankful for the people in your life and the limited amount of time that we have on this planet. The people around your tree this year may not be there next year. It is more important to enjoy the moments with those you love than it is to purchase the perfect gift. The gift will be set-aside in time, but memories will last a lifetime. It truly is the most wonderful time of the year.

Nothing to wear

/ rachelgoes262 / 1 Comment

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One of my favorite bloggers is Courtney Carver, who authors both Be More With Less  and Project 333. Courtney helps to bring minimalism into the realm of reality acknowledging that the movement is not an exercise in sacrifice or denial, but rather an effort to live life more fully with the people and experiences most important in our lives.

To this end, I have been following the Project 333 movement, without exactly conforming to its specifications. I honestly am completely unaware of how many items of clothing I have. My efforts have been to strive for an amount that is enough without being overwhelming. Over the past few years, I have been trying to move away from the familiar distain of standing in front of an overstuffed closet complaining I have “nothing to wear” to a more simplified and streamlined morning routine. My goal is for all of my clothing to fit into my closet and dresser without having numerous storage bins scattered around the house trying to contain the overflow. I want to be comfortable in my clothes while being able to meet the demands of the activities in my life. I want to wear things that I love every single day.

Since following Project 333 and putting many of the suggestions into action, I have found that I spend less time doing laundry, less time worrying about going shopping for certain items of clothing, less time packing when I travel, and more time enjoying things in my life that were previously lost due to never ending cycles of laundry.

I have less decision fatigue and less stress in my life. I am no longer running late in the morning throwing various items of clothing around only to come home to a mess of shirts and pants scattered around the bedroom.

Perhaps some of the most helpful tips I have garnered from Project 333 include only wearing what I love, and choosing items that are timeless. If I wear something and find it to be completely uncomfortable or frumpy, then it is the last time I wear that outfit and it ends up in the donate pile. I am then left with items in which I am comfortable wearing every single day. I have noticed that this has left me with a uniform of sorts – dress pants or jeans paired with v-neck tops in various colors. While uniforms sound boring and remind me of private school when I was a teenager, they are in fact, quite versatile. I have plenty of colors to choose from and can mix and match items if I stick to solids and minimize prints.

Minimizing my wardrobe is definitely a work in progress. I am still not quite sure what to do with all my race shirts, and I still have one storage container full of clothes that is too many for my comfort level. My goal is to have all my clothes fit into my closet and one dresser with perhaps one storage bin of seasonal items that rotate in and out. I am currently at two storage bins, mostly due to race shirts and some sentimental items that I have been putting off facing.

Getting dressed for the day is quite simple. If I hit the snooze button too many times, I am no longer slowing my morning down even further by trying to decide what to wear. I can virtually pull any pair of pants out of the drawer and match them with the nearest top. I have kept my dress slacks and dress skirts with blazers for more formal or professional events such as when I defended my thesis. I have some sundresses that I love to wear for the summer.

Laundry has always been something that stresses me out. I was typically doing two to three loads per week. I don’t understand how one person can produce so much laundry! Now that I have streamlined my wardrobe, I typically have one load per week, sometimes two if I am washing a load of running gear. Growing up, I remember laundry day was always this huge event, where the car was literally loaded with clothes. Once a month, I would be dropped off to do 10-15 loads of laundry. We needed a huge amount of clothes to be able to make it to laundry day once a month. They were not even in laundry baskets – there would be huge trash bags full of clothes. I do not ever want to spend one entire day each month doing laundry again. Creating a capsule or minimalist wardrobe may mean that you have to do smaller loads more frequently, but it is better than losing one entire day per month to laundry.

I am fortunate that I now have a washer and dryer at my house and can avoid the Laundromat. However, if you do have to use the Laundromat, it may be easier to spend two hours twice a month than an entire day once a month. Can you pare back your clothes so that you have enough to last two weeks instead of an entire month? Less clothes means less stress in maintenance and ensures that you are only wearing what you truly love and not items that don’t fit well or don’t feel right.

I have learned that my experiences are more important than what I am wearing. I do not need a t-shirt for every place I visit or event I attend. Memories of the experience are more important. With a streamlined wardrobe, I can easily find what I want, and am not spending a lot of time washing, drying, folding, and ironing. I take that time and spend it with my family and friends.

If you find yourself standing in front of your closet every morning with “nothing to wear,” you may want to consider Project 333. The best part is, you can break the rules. You do not have to feel like it is an exercise in sacrifice or denial, if 33 does not work for you, then try 58 or 75. Whatever works for you is fine! The goal is not the number; the goal is to simplify your day so that you have more time doing things you love. Maybe your goal is not a specific number, but maybe space issues like mine. Maybe you want all of your clothes to fit in a certain container or area. However you choose to incorporate Project 333 into your life, you will feel the effects of the program in all aspects of your life. You will have more time and feel happier being able to engage in activities you love with less stress.

With the holiday season upon us, we can all use less stress and more time with those we love. It’s time to stop standing in front of a stuffed closet with “nothing to wear.”

I can Adult (sort of)

/ rachelgoes262 / 1 Comment

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Back in the 90s, MTV brought us one of the trailblazers in the reality TV movement: The Real World, with all of is spin-offs such as Boston, LA, Miami, and San Francisco to name a few. I just googled, and they are currently readying to start season 31. Phew. That’s a lot of drama, lies, sex, and cheating.

I finally finished grad school this past Monday. Yes, I did it! I defended and lived to tell the tale. I have taught preschool for over 11 years and have no problem standing in front of a room full of 3 year olds singing the “Baby Bumblebee” song, yet when it came to a 13 minute presentation to a room of only 6 people, I totally forgot to breathe when I was talking and almost passed out. But, I did make it, and they will be mailing me the oddly shaped piece of paper with the pretty writing on it in a few weeks.

I have now entered The Real World.

I have been in the Real World for a while now. I’m in my mid-30s after all. Yet, when you are juggling full-time school with full-time work, somehow people expect you to fall apart and marvel at your ability to keep it together. I think once you officially enter The Real World where you are only working full-time and trying to adult that the opposite is true: people expect you to keep it together and wonder what is wrong with you when you don’t.

In the past few days, I am in total awe of my own ability to keep it together. Weird, I know. I am noticing that certain things have happened in the past few days would have caused me to have complete meltdown if I was still in school. When you are overbooked and trying to juggle too many things, sometimes even the most innocuous incident can be the tipping point that pushes you to lose your mind. I am able to handle crisis situations much more calmly these past few days than I have in the past. There is hope for me yet. I can Adult.

Sort of.

It still feels fake. I have all these degrees and fancy credentials, which scream to the world, “look at me! I know something!” Really, I don’t. Yesterday, I could not even figure out how to use a scanner machine. No amount of education in the world will ever replace common sense.

Even though I may have the ability to Adult in the Real World, I still feel stuck in this student mentality that says that I am only getting through this moment so that I can continue with and finish school and move onto something better. Except, now I really am done with school, and everything has come to a dead halt. It’s like riding a galloping horse that suddenly decides to stop and completely throws you off, ass over ankles.

I’m just a little scared. I have no idea what I’m doing or what to do with myself.

Education is this cozy little cocoon that cradles you in the Ivory Tower of academia. Now, that ‘m out, I have to do it on my own and that is completely frightening. One of the things I have realized that came with being a student for the past 20 years is that I quite regularly received an allowance twice a year. Every semester, the student loan money would release and help me to get caught up on everything I either neglected or was not simply able to deal with in the whirlwind that was school and employment in low-wage jobs for long hours.

Uncle Sam has been my sugar daddy (in the form of student loans), and now I’m cut off. Not only do I have no one to bail me out, but also I have 20 years worth of allowance to pay back. Being an adult is kind of hard. I don’t live in the Real World of the TV series that is full of parties, drama, and relationships. I’m in the Real World of work, bills, and student loan debt.

Reality is scary. To conjure another 90s media reference, Reality Bites.

So while these past few days has shown me that I am capable of acting like an adult, it has also shown me that I bumble. I am far from perfect. One thing I do know is that being an adult is a lot easier when you are not trying to be in school full-time on top of all your other Real World obligations. Life is so much easier to handle when you slow down and have less on your plate.

While I fondly remember watching the Real World in my dorm room in the 90s (love him or hate him, you gotta remember Puck!), I am so glad that my life is not full of the drama of the TV series. I may be in the Real World, but in this world, I can Adult (sort of),

It really helps to adult when you rewind real slow.