The Super Quick Catch Up...

Partially from an email to a friend

My trip to Colombia was so great, it was wonderful seeing my in-laws and playing with my nephews, being in warm climates (even a Caribbean island for a couple days!) and getting out of my routine in general. I have some pictures up here if you are interested, but no pressure! http://www.flickr.com/photos/hum97/

Coming home to freezing cold temperatures, and diving back into work was too much of a shock I think, and I got sick for quite a while. Being sick put me behind for Christmas, and between that and being behind already from the two week trip, things seem to have just piled up in a big way to the point I take a look at it, freak out and retreat to my silly little video games on my iPod. Add the continuing super cold temperatures, grey, nasty weather with at least a few more months of the same ahead, extra shifts at the cafe to cover for someone out of the country and having paperwork trouble getting back in and yeah, I think I'm in a bit of a depression. sigh. So, fingers crossed this guy I've been covering for at the cafe will get back to the country tomorrow, I think not having to do double shifts over the weekend will help a lot.

I am plugging along though, I started taking some guitar lessons that I very much like, and I've started seeing a Chinese herbalist/accupressurist who is helping me get more healthy. I have a potential plan to do some recording with a local friend that is really exciting. There is a local dance company going to put on a show in March with music by local musicians and one of the dancers may use one of my songs that I'd record with the friend. I'm sure I'll post/tweet about that as it happens, so hopefully it will work out.

****

My word that came to me for this year is Action. I think it's a good one. More about choosing and doing. Creating what I want in my life. Going for it. It has been hard these cold weeks to get moving, but it HAS helped me at least a few times when I've been feeling inertia. Now for that to start happening more often!

Be the change

So, at the risk of offending people who might have a different idea about me, and in order to tell about this realization I had today, I am going to share - I don't usually make the bed. Like, 19 times out of 20 probably. I don't really see the point. There are a lot of other things I want to be spending time on, and if we have people over, it's easy to just shut the door. I usually only make it when I need to fold clothes and I don't want them to get lost in the sheets.

I also don't usually go to bed at the same time as G. Night-owlism, procrastination, distraction, freaking out, working late, catching up, whathaveyou, it varies in phases from a little late to very very late. (Lately leaning to very very, argh). When I do get to bed, G usually gets grumbly because I shift all the blankets around that are tangled in order to be covered. I've tried to tell him many times that if he would arrange the blankets when he got into bed, I wouldn't disturb him as much when I came.

For some reason this morning it hit me. I bet if I would make the bed in the morning, the blankets would still be in pretty good shape at night, even if I got there second. It seems pretty obvious now, but I was oblivious to it before. So wrapped up in wanting him to think about me and leave things in a way that would show he was thinking about me. On the few nights that I go to bed first I am very aware of leaving the night lights on, etc, and wish the same could be done for me.

There is that saying about being the change you wish to see in the world. One of those ones that sounds all very well and good, but come on - how can I BE world peace? or BE the end of hunger? I'm sure someone out there has an answer for that, but for the most part the concepts that are too big, too overwhelming. I've been thinking about some of the stuff I learned in Peru, about asking for small things - please help me climb up these ruins today. please help me finish my homework. please help me find sweetness in life outside of food. please help me go to bed at a decent hour. (!) :-)

Is it really so selfish to ask for little things that help you be more comfortable and happy? Because a comfortable, happy person is more likely to be productive and contribute, to have the energy to help others, etc, etc.

So yes. I'll get to go test my theory now. If it works, I've found a good reason to make the bed every day. And both of us will get a better, more comfortable night's sleep, waking up to be happier people. Who knows how that will affect our days?

Be the change.

Little changes can make a big difference.

PS In other news - I AM SO TIRED OF BEING COLD DAMMIT!!!!! It just seems to keep snowing and snowing and snowing. ;-(

Buffets

A friend of a friend made a very good analogy the other day that still has me thinking. We were at a little birthday party and someone was commenting about how Facebook was so overwhelming with all the crazy applications and everything, and this guy said "Facebook is like a buffet - some people sample everything, some people pick and choose. It doesn't mean both aren't enjoying and getting something out of it."

I thought that was brilliant, useful and very accurate. Similar to Chris Brogan's analogy that Twitter is like a cocktail party, and you shouldn't expect or try to follow and contact everyone - just drop in on the conversations that interest you and gracefully move from one to the next, knowing full well that there is a room full of people you won't even get to.

Here's my problem though, in online life AND at real buffets. I want to try everything. My powers of discrimination and saying no to things are not my strong point. So many things interest me (in life and in food), and when it comes to people, I don't want to hurt anyone's feelings. I'm good at finding the positive side to nearly any situation, at trying to see things from another point of view, at not assuming that my way is the only way or the right way for everyone else (though I can be darn stubborn when it comes to my way being the right way for ME.) When I worked at the online art company and I had to choose a gallery of say 15 potential products that would be a good match for a client, I'd come up with 45 possibilities, manage to cut it down to maybe 30 and then beg one of my more decisive co-worker friends to weed out the extra 15 because for every piece of art I was able to say "but someone might like that because _______!" Sigh.

I have noticed and realized that the online buffet of distractions is WAY more than one could ever consume in a lifetime, let alone a single sitting, and I've even coached others who feel overwhelmed by online stuff to go in the "pick and choose" direction, but doing it for myself is another matter. I always marvel at those people who go to buffets and have just a few things on their plate, with space in-between! They probably marvel at me with all the food piled up and touching.

I think there must be a balance to it all. A way to be decisive and inclusive. Of course some situations call more for it than others. The pile of soggy broccoli in the steam bath at the buffet is not going to get it's feelings hurt if I don't eat it. A friend on Facebook MIGHT notice if I ignore one of their app invites, but more likely than not they aren't going to notice. But they WILL notice if I leave them a personal comment...

One thing I really like about the MySpace blogs and about pretty much any posting on Facebook is the ability to give a kudos or a like or thumbs up. Shows that a person was there, saw and paid attention if only for a second to what you were posting, and says "Rock on. I see you, keep doing what you're doing". It's a quick and easy way to let people know they aren't broadcasting to an empty room. It's really important to me because it seems like so many people DON'T let on that they've seen/heard/watched what people post. I see people out in real life after wondering if ANYONE was listening, and they say "Oh, I heard you a couple weeks ago on the radio!" and it always makes me feel so happy to know someone was paying attention after all the work I put in. But getting a little thumbs up does the same thing closer to the moment...

I wonder how much being decisive has to do with a person's confidence in the abundance of the universe? I think part of why I overdo it at buffets is I want to get my money's worth and I don't know when I'll get to experience this particular food again, so if something is really good, I want more in the moment. If I could be secure in the knowledge that the right food for me will always be there when I need it, and solid in the knowledge that more important than getting my money's worth is to get the proper nourishment's worth rather than overstuffing and feeling sluggish for the rest of the day, I think I'd be ahead by leaps and bounds in life.

I've been rather this way since I was a baby apparently - my mom said it was hard to get me to go to sleep because it seemed like I was always afraid of missing out on something. Right now the analogy popping to mind is the one about squeezing a handful of sand - the tighter you grip, the more slips through your fingers! How can I go through more areas of my life with open hands? How silly of me to want to hold the whole beach! I can APPRECIATE the whole beach with my eyes and mind, and intimately, immediately enjoy what's right in front of me and in my hands. The fact that there's a whole beach and bazillions of grains of sand I can't possibly get to on a grain by grain basis doesn't mean I can't appreciate the whole.

Similar tactic I've heard when going to a museum - rather than trying to see EVERYTHING and getting burnt out - go into the room, glance around at everything from the center, or make a quick pass around it all, then see where you are drawn and take time to just BE with that one piece of artwork. More joy from less volume but higher quality. Yes.

I hope solidifying this realization is the first step to living it...

Grah!!

So what's my deal? SO MUCH I want and need to do, and I spend all my time at home either sleeping or online reading blogs and "social networking". It's one of those things that's really hard for me to figure out how to balance, and until recently I haven't really even had any desire to. It's kind of hard because I can't just turn it off altogether - there ARE important and valid connections I'm making and/or maintaining and valuable things that I'm learning.

But how do I know which are the important things? There's ALWAYS more to read/see/do online and sometimes I find myself doing the STUPIDEST things - like re-arranging my freaking plants on my Facebook Green Patch. SERIOUSLY! WHO THE FREAK CARES?! But when you have infinite choice, that's exactly what you have to do, CHOOSE. I think sometimes I do the dumb things like organizing plants because it's mindless, yet it feels like some tiny corner of my world I can have control over. Like somehow I can think better or feel like master of my universe if my plants are arranged more or less in rainbow order. Because there's so much I can't control, so much chaos. hrmph.

Really been thinking more about some of the conversation Trick and I seem to have going the past few days (see his comments on previous posts). It's kind of amazing, pretty much all stuff I know in theory, stuff I've heard before and understood, but it all flies out the window when it comes to me and my own art - why is that?

The editor - the evil editor. I know, I know she needs to go sit in the back room while I'm CREATING and can come back AFTER there's even something to critique. I've gotten way, way better at managing her, but she still manages to poke her head in at the most inopportune moments.

I sat in on a brilliant session at Song School where Steve Seskin and Susan Werner starting co-writing a song on the fly in front of a bunch of us. Susan went a little bonkers, bouncing around, chewing A LOT of gum, pacing, lying down (I think?). Anyway, someone asked her afterwards what was up with the gum (It was like a whole big pack) and she explained that she was doing everything she could to distract the editor and just BE in the moment. I thought it was brilliant. Both that she was brave enough to show us what it took for her to get the best place for writing, and that she'd figured it out for herself, her bag of tricks.

The problem for me I think, is I don't just have an editor for writing, it's for most of life! How exhausting is that? Very. Very. I think I may have actually done pretty well lately when I actually get down to the real writing at letting the creativity flow. But getting to the point where I allow myself to do it, allow myself to write, well the critic always has a whole bunch of things I should do first - clean the kitchen, make the bed, fold the laundry, write to potential interviewees, blog on the music blog, clear out old files on my computer and back it up, file papers, purge the closets and take stuff to Lucky Day, cook food, organize drawers, detail the car, vacuum the birdseed off the floor, DUST (omg do I ever need to dust), exercise, practice, do homework, etc, etc. All these things I SHOULD do first, and yet I don't do ANY of them, I just mess around online.

It's easier. It feels productive somehow. It seems like any one thing I want to do is just going to take a couple of seconds. But add up all the sites, checking messages, reading posts, leaving comments, and all of a sudden it's 11:30 at night and I'm too tired to think and give the proper attention and energy to the important things. It doesn't take a lot of brain power to check Twitter posts. But if I don't keep up on them, it takes a long time to catch up. (and there I just went and spent 20 minutes checking all those sites again. damn)

But the thing I've been thinking about is that I need to get my head on straight with the music. Back to the joy of just doing it. Because what's the point if I'm just as miserable forcing it, piling expectations and demands on it? That's no different than the office jobs I'd be trying to escape! I have a pretty good set up right now of part-time, and in an office environment that rocks, working with and on the business side of music. And I have so many ideas for when we have more users about how to make it a fun and useful community.

I have ideas for the musicians I'm helping out too. It's just hard to know when to put the ideas out there. I don't want to step on any toes or tell someone how to live their life or do their thing. Or like some of the ideas I've put out and they've been well received as ideas, but how to actually get them into reality?

And then, and then, what about me?