Salutations friends & countrymen!
The spring is in full throttle before us and in Portland the shift in weather has created a palpable frenetic joy among the town folk, myself included. The beginning of the year 2016 has felt really busy and spilling over the sides of capacity, something that while uncomfortable in the moment, has it's value in terms of fomenting growth.
April seemed like a good time to check in with y'all, the last time I wrote I was in the midst of some significant self imposed challenges to my personal status quo. Now I have completed those challenges and wanted to take a moment to reflect both on the meanings of the challenges and the implications of completing them.
The first challenge was to stop drinking alcohol for six months, and that was a birthday resolution. Every year, on my birthday I decide to make a change that has either been difficult for me to realize in my life or that will insert a bit of flux in my day to day in a meaningful way. This challenge fell in the latter category, and one of my biggest take aways from the process has been how interesting folk's reactions were. People always seemed quite curious as to why I was undertaking such an endeavor and would often either not be satisfied with my response or say something about how they would never be able to do that. I think people (especially friends) were impressed and supportive as well, something that coupled with accountability definitely did a good job of egging me on.
I thought about it and how it was affecting my life experience mostly every day of the challenge, in varying degrees. For example, if I was out at a restaurant having dinner I would think about what beverage I would prefer to be having instead of a non-alcoholic alternative. Or if I was driving home past a nice outdoor patio on a sunny day I would day dream of what that would feel like and look forward to a time when I would be able to do it again.
Self imposed restrictions are funny things. Of course I can do whatever the heck I want, and a few times I thought what if I sneak a drink, no one will ever know. It's amusing to me, the thought no one will ever know because that's not the point and because it is a suggestion from myself to myself regarding something I have decided to do. Ever since watching Pixar's film Inside Out I have been more and more aware of of these internal dialogues and trying to isolate where the different thoughts are coming from. Different mental sections and factions guiding faculties awry. We wage little battles inside of ourselves everyday, and every day we are both the victor and the spoils.
With not drinking, I would say the biggest joy I derived was from successfully completing the challenge. In some respects I had no doubts, and in others I was equally as curious as everyone else as to whether I would in fact complete it. This is another notch in my will power belt, something that can always use strengthening and moral support.
Coming back into it now I definitely think I want it to play a different role in my life, mostly be less present and more special. Drinking is a super fun activity and a really useful stress reliever, but it can only be one of the options and not one that is without it's own set of repercussions. So I think I am more mindful of those now that I have been without, plus I sound more convincing to myself when I say you can do this.
Wee!
Also, holy crap! I am 33 1/2!! Hahah, that probably was my other take away, time goes really quickly and faster as you age. Here we are!
The other challenge was to stop the Internet dating, and that was an uncharacteristic New Year's resolution. Originally the goal was to cut it off by three months, then my friend convinced me to make it four months so that one month of drinking would overlap with a month of not online dating. The purpose of that ostensibly was to see what the romantic bar scene was like in Portland. Whatever the point was I caved and kept to my original intention of three months, so I just signed up for Tinder again in the last days of March.
Anyone who knows me knows that those two things in particular (drinking and dating) are things that took up a not insignificant amount of my free time, so giving them up was an intentional and almost brash choice to shake it up.
The reason I decided to get back on, aside from not being excited at the prospect of meeting guys at bars, was that I was getting bored. How do people meet people?!?! There was no one at work that was not already spoken for, and no friends of friends were speaking to me in that special kinda way.
When I began thinking about signing on to online dating again I started getting anxious, especially thinking about the Ok Cupid scene. The idea of writing out my profile and pouring over the profiles of others in search for relevant nuggets and cute faces made me feel a little revolted. In the end I decided that I would do a "soft opening" and go with just the tinder. It felt low key enough and would not take up a considerate amount of time and could plug in easily in my evenings of tea and Star Trek (needless to say that the #startrekandtinder hashtag has not taken off).
Similar to the booze, I was pleased to have a break from it, and pleased to get back into it. I have a date today for the first time in the last three months, it's totally still fun and exciting and a little bit dreadful. I have changed my attitude towards the whole process to be more casual, not more casual in my ultimate intention, which is to be in a serious LTR, but more causal in my approach. I make myself available, and I am responsive, but I am trying to not put too much of myself out there and to not take anything personally. We'll see how it goes. Already I am giddy and inspired and having all sorts of sweet day dreams, romantic connection is something that is core to the fruition of my humanity, I can't deny that. I also realize that I have little control over that happening, and all I can do is my best at realizing all of those aspects that don't require being paired off.
I have been cultivating friendships, looking into more hobbies, exploring my geography, jumping on trampolines, and eating waffles.
It's pretty OK.
:)
Till next time gentle reader, expect great things.
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