Being on holiday gives you the opportunity to stop and reflect a little. Here's a little progress report on where I'm at with a few things.
I like making routines, but often feel obliged to keeping them even when they're not serving me any more.
I've just let go of an agreement to speak to someone every week day, which I've been doing (imperfectly) for a few years now. We had a format to our conversation, it usually took 30-45 minutes and at one point it was a really good way for me to stay connected to things I wanted to do and to help someone else out at the same time, in a peer-to-peer way. I realised a few months ago that simply holding to this commitment meant putting a lot more into the arrangement than I was getting out, but that I felt unable to let it go or even look for ways to rebalance or change the format. I'd just had enough. But it took me until this week to be able to say "This isn't working for me any more, I need something different" I feel like I should stick to arrangements, no matter what.
I don't like it when some prior arrangement or someone else's needs intrude into my routine. I find it difficult to work out when I should yield and when I should hold my ground.
Equally, I think that other people should stick to agreements but also change them when I change my routine, without me needing to say anything. My running routine is that I go out at 7.30am every other morning, before breakfast and so I come back between 8 and half past. This works with Laura's work routine, she leaves the house between 8 and half past. So I can get my breakfast ready, have a shower, dress, eat and meditate and be good for anything else by 9am. Somehow (I wasn't paying attention, clearly) we've also got an arrangement that our cleaner comes at 8am on Wednesday (I know, first world problems). So today I felt really uncomfortable and didn't know what to do. I needed help to work out the best option, given that I didn't want either to come back for my run while they were working, nor need access to the kitchen and bathroom at that time. So I got up as normal, had my breakfast before they came and then waited an hour and a half (and they'd gone) for me to go out myself.
I'm not good at putting my own oxygen mask on first and then helping others
I'm working on this. It's deeply ingrained in me to be thinking about what other people need and how I ought to be helping them out. And that's a good thing if I'm also getting enough sleep, eating properly, putting my work first and keeping promises to myself about my own self-care.
I've always known that I would eventually take up exercise again. It's been a gap in my personal practice for some time. And I am also afraid of what changes it might bring.
I like using my body more. I like the way it feels the rest of the day. I love how I feel when I get back - alive! Just going out, even at 7.30am and running along the quiet riverbank, sometimes feels confronting. For a while, when I started, I would notice that I was feeling anxious whenever I came across anyone for the first time that day. That's receded, but I'm not comfortable with running past the slow dog walkers, I don't want to get entangled in their morning stroll. There's a fairly esoteric link between this running lark and creating stuff in the real world - it includes the mind/body thing, that we think with our whole bodies, not just our heads, but also just an undefined something about the difference between me lying in bed between 7 and 8 in the morning and getting up, putting my running gear on and pounding the pathways.