Stuck in the questioning…

I find myself stuck in this space of questioning everything at the minute. I feel like life used to be simple. When I wanted to do something. I probably mulled over it for a minute, maybe even less, made a decision and off we went.

Once decisions were made we mostly just kept swimming regardless of how things turned out, we just dealt with whatever challenges came up, as they came up.  I don’t remember ever before questioning everything we did and why we did it.

Now I don’t believe there is a single thing in my life that I haven’t questioned in the last month.

Friendships.

Social outings.

The way we spend our time.

The way we spend our money.

Our relationship.

The work I do, both online and off.

Our house.

Whether or not I should sell both kids to the circus? (ha!)

Of course, most of it is probably because I am totally avoiding having to think about the biggest question of all.  Will we try again or are we done?  

I can’t even go there at the minute.  That question is on the shelf, which I thought would be a relief.  Unfortunately it seems to have given me no relief at all.  Instead it has just given me eleventy-billion questions about everything else in my life.

Why am I doing this again?

Is all the time I put into this worth it?

Do I enjoy this?

What would like look and feel like if we didn’t do this instead?

Is this right for us anymore?

Maybe a big change would help?
Maybe this is a bad time to make any changes?

Am I going crazy?

Perhaps questioning is a good thing? Maybe it is good to be questioning everything in life, rather than just accepting what is.  Of course I don’t want to wake up at 60 and realise I just did what I thought I was meant to do, and suddenly realise that I actually had a lot of choices that I didn’t bother making because I was too complacent to bother.

But then again isn’t acceptance, where happiness is found?  Uhhhh – that’s what I tell people in my yoga classes. Yes I’m totally questioning all that too. Feeling like a total fraud telling people to quieten their inner voices whilst mine is going certifiably insane.

In-between all this questioning I guess I have been making some progress.  I’ve slowly been working my way through my happy list.  If you missed that post and my list you can check it out here. 

#6 Take a family holiday away and completely switch off.

We went away last week as a family and it was nice to have no obligations, no work, no ‘should be doings’.  Life is so easy on holidays, the hardest decision is ‘do we eat out or buy something and eat in?’

We all like each other more. We’re more patient. More connected.  And then you come back to reality and everything feels like a hard slog again, plus you’ve got three thousand loads of washing to catch up on.

I’ve been trying to keep that holiday feeling going.  Staying off my phone, because god knows that little ‘smart’ device is often the reason for my overwhelm.

#7 Continue reading a book per week.

I’ve replaced social media with lots of reading and that feels goooooood.  Reading real books because there really is nothing better than actually holding paper and cardboard in your hands and turning real pages. Also this means there is no chance of getting distracted and ‘just checking in on Facebook’, and next thing you know it’s an hour later…

#14 Take an online course in something… Just. For. Me.

I haven’t enrolled in an online course but I did pick up “The Artist’s Way” by Julie Cameron the other day without realising it is a 12 week course. Though I’m still claiming this as checking off this item – my list, my rules. I’ve been doing a little bit of each day and though the commitment is only to myself, it has kept me doing my own writing and creating every day rather then once a month when I actually ‘have time’.

Journalling is something that I’ve been doing a lot of since these losses – writing down all my crazy definitely feels like it helps and the ‘morning pages’ task has been reminding me that I do better when I write daily, not just when it all gets to much and I hit rock bottom.  It helps me somewhat avoid that cycle of…

I remember to do things that make me feel good >> I feel good >> I do more social things >> I get tired >> I start letting the stuff that keeps it all together go ie. eating well, not relying on caffeine, moving, writing, giving myself time to sit and feel >> I  crash and burn from emotional overwhelm and feel like I’m drowning in the grief of it all.

Yep it’s a super fun cycle. One that I need to stay on top of to keep myself out of.

#8 Eat veggies from our own veggie patch.

I can’t cross this one off yet but these babies are growing nicely!

#9 Take myself out on weekly coffee & book writing dates.

Definitely haven’t been doing this weekly over the holidays but there has been a lot of just lazing around.  I hadn’t realised how much of a maniac I was before. Literally every nap and spare moment without children was filled with working. Now I’ve swung full circle in the opposite direction and only do things that make me feel good. It’s not overly productive, but magically the things that need to get done, still seem to, so I’m trying not to worry about it.

#10 Feel strong and healthy in my body again.

This one is a work in progress for sure.  The FEEL part is the hardest. I know what to do to be healthy. I know what foods to eat and what movement works best for me.  My challenge is getting over the mindset hurdles – getting over the negative feelings I have about my body and the overarching ‘why bother’.

I’m getting there slowly. I’m trying to add some different movement other than yoga to shake things up a bit, to shake off that ‘stale’ feeling I have. I’ve gone for a run, done some circuit workouts and have booked in that aerial yoga I wanted to do. Food-wise I’ve been looking into hormone balancing foods, (because I feel like mine are all whack) so that is helping me to eat more of the good stuff rather than, you know, living on peanut butter.

So that’s me at the minute.  Making progress slowly. Questioning everything.  How is your happy list coming along?