Breathing out, I smile – Bringing ZEN to the life of a DFW

savingwannabe

Hello Marru i felll asleep after shopping today and have just woken up!!! Are we supposed to fill in the dreamline aspirations form?

Can you explain for the thicky (me?) - this looks rather exciting. I remember when Firewalker wrote about Tim Ferriss but i didn't see this page.

Marru

You don't have to go to the page to download the form, you can just copy my headings and do it without. I put the link there for further info for those who are interested. And there are no obligations to publish your list either. Just a bit of fun.

Marru

So if you did that little exercise yesterday I hope you have forgotten now all about what your answers were and want to play further. Today I would like you to write down a description of your perfect day. What time do you wake up, where do you live, what do you do, who are you with etc. And there are no limitations at all.

I have been busy this evening listing stuff on fleabay - did 8 items which doesn't sound a lot but is a massive achievement for me. I hope some of them sells. I am now too tired to put here what my perfect day looked like when I did this exercise. I shall do it either lunch time tomorrow or tomorrow evening.

savingwannabe

Hello Marru, well done on fleabay.

My perfect day would start with a leisurely lie in, then bacon sarnies for lunch, meeting my MSE friends and having fun. Even if we spend it in a Poundshop we still have fun as long as they let me have some chocolate!!! Problem is usually I am at work so I dont get to see them as often as i would like. If Steve McQueen was involved it might get rude so I had better keep schtum!!!

Marru

I was very calm and happy until for what ever reason when I got home wanted just to shut myself in. I don’t even know what triggered it. I think what I need to do is to give DD something small to eat, take myself upstairs for 15 minutes, put oil burner on and just sit there for little while before coming down to do tea for us. I hope it will work.


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Anyway – I promised to talk about my perfect day exercise. Here goes:

I would wake up around 8 am, walk my dogs and have breakfast. Do work until lunch time. This could be paid work and/or promoting animal welfare. Probably mix of both. Then I would go riding, training my dogs, volunteering in animal shelters until tea time. Then the evening is for stitching and reading.

I would live somewhere quiet where I can keep horses and chickens but not too far from a smallish/medium size town that has all the services and shops one might need. I would have four wheel drive and it would be full of dog hair. I would have agility track in my yard and people would come and use it to train their dogs. One of my dogs would qualify for the obedience competition in Crufts.

I don’t know if I would be living with BF and/or DD. But I would have a house keeper who cooks all the evening meals and leaves lunches for weekend in the freezer for me/us. Also I would have someone looking after the horses and chickens (the mucking out stuff).


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So now if you have done these two exercises you should have a pretty good idea where you want to go but I want to stretch this a little bit further. More about that tomorrow.

AnnieG

Hi Marru
I haven't read your previous diary but stumbled across this one and like the way it reads. I've suffered with depression in the past, and am currently on a massive dose of antidepressants.
What interested me was your reading about Buddhism. It's something I'm interested in. I'm also looking at doing a course on Mindfulness.
I'll subscribe to your diary as I'm interested in what you say.
Annie

Marru

Hello AnnieG and thank you for popping in. I hope your medication is working for you and also that you find inspiration from my [STRIKE]struggles[/STRIKE] journey

Talking of which, woke up bit out of sorts this morning, I have bribed DD to watch telly while I guzzle down a cup of coffee. I think what was upsetting me yesterday was the fact that I didn't get a chance to tidy DD's room during the summer holidays which means that I couldn't find that lost school library book which means that now I have to pay for it. It feels so stupid for having to pay for that book when I have house literally full of books. Hey ho so be it. Perhaps I shouldn't have had that last attempt last night to find it, I just got more wound up. But on the positive note I did manage to unpack two removal boxes of her stuff while there searching for it.

Plan of action: from now on as soon as I come home with DD we do her reading (and book goes straight back into her school wallet), then I retire for 15 minutes for little bit of quiet time and then I do our tea and only then I am logging on to computer and doing my study etc stuff. Cut off point is 10 pm the latest for little bit of stitching time before bed. Lets see if this works.

PS: I have watcher on 3 items :j, I don't mind if I have only one bidder each as I set up the prices so that I will be over the moon if they sell.

Marru

I found out today that I hadn’t got that promotion I applied for. I am not upset because I didn’t get it. I am upset because or the reason they gave. It was more like an excuse. And that made me think what could have been the real reason behind it and only thing I was able to come up with was the fact that I told them about my depression last winter when I ran myself down and didn’t go to the GP until near crash. At that time I had to take week off from work to let the ADs kick in. They are thinking that I can’t cope with the job when I found that being unfair. I think that my performance since has shown remarkable recovery and capability and it should be my decision anyway if I feel I can cope, not theirs.

Anyway I haven’t got along with my manager that well anyway. Sometimes I think I am paranoid and sometimes I think that there really is something. I wish I knew what it is. Today then she asked me about one of the half days that I have requested as holiday. I think she was trying to make something out of nothing as she had muddled up the months. I managed to point out her mistake without giving away that I had noticed her mistake. How is that for diplomacy. Then I got asked about some back up prints for my journal but even that felt like a clutching straws from her side (I haven’t changed the way I do that journal in last months so why start asking about it now?).

So all this swimming in my head and unfortunately I had lots of time to think today as the system was beyond slow (I even had time to write little something to my blog). What is the outcome? Yes I am tired, no I am not upset, yes I am going to give myself an evening off as I am very new on the path of Zen and I can’t get through a days like this without there being ripples. One day perhaps I can just glide serenely through them. At least the biggest waves have been avoided.

What next? I would love to just throw towel in the ring and start my self employment NOW. But I know now is not the right time. There are several reasons (yes, I have thought about this, they are reasons not excuses) for this. So the next best thing is that I have applied to be moved to a new team that is going to be created. The work is going to be more challenging and fun and will look good on my CV. Also I need to get all my PER signed off. I might wait until I know who will be my manager and then get the assignments signed off as soon as possible after the next exams. And I need to start putting the money my company have spent on my studies aside. If I get another job I need to pay it all back.

Tasks for tonight: Calculate how much money I would have needed to put aside so far and make a saving plan, pay this month’s school clubs, -lunches and C tax. Then rest of the evening is for rest.

Oh and how is this for an ending for a day: my recycling bin has vanished, need to call the council tomorrow to ask what happened to it. I am sorry but I am failing to see the lesson in that.

Back to the little exercises: You should now have a list of the things you want to achieve and also a good idea what your perfect day would look like. Now is time to think what are the things in your life here and now that make your days better. What need to happen for things really tick for you and your family. Please come and tell me as I am struggling with this one. Oh I’ve got one, having that first cup of coffee in the quiet house. What are yours?

ETA: I thought THIS might be appropriate

savingwannabe

Oh my gosh. I liked this song haven't heard it for a while. I have a headache but it is actually doing me good.

Sometimes you have to trust your instincts. Don't get upset get even by getting a job you want where you will feel comfortable. It is good that you are applying to another team.

This might be too simplistic as I haven't thought too deeply: What makes my days better? Looking at the garden and surroundings, looking at trees, listening to birds in the garden and watching the foxes, the fact i have holidays and I have my health back (I can't afford to do much now but it is nice to rest), looking forward to making plans for the future, I live in a nice quiet area, I have great friends who cheer me up and make me laugh and forget my problems, I have cable tv, I know my parents love me, I have my dreams of what my house will look like and i know that when the building work is done I know that I will travel again. I have a job that I do essentially enjoy I just dont like some of the people I work with but hey the salary is good. I have this site which helps me to unwind but on the other hand sometimes i do get rather wound up but i do like it here on MSE and am glad I came back.

Marru

Today was first beaver meeting for DD since the summer holidays. This means that I am sitting in the car for hour and a bit waiting for her to finish. When it gets colder and darker I think I need to use that hour to do the weekly shopping instead of leaving it for Saturday.

But today was still warm and light enough to sit in the car. I had my kindle and note book as company. I was challenged this morning to brainstorm about achieving my goals so there I was sitting just writing without analysing or judging. I got small ideas and I got very big ideas (and I got very silly ideas). Actually I am now excited but also very scared. What I really want to do is big, very risky and takes me so completely out of my comfort zone that it is not even funny. However I am not planning on doing it tomorrow. I am gong to plan backwards to find the steps that need to be taken before that big thing is possible. But not when I am tired. That is for next Wensday the latest when I am sitting in my car for over an hour again.

Further good news are that it seems that my transfer to the new team is going to happen. :j It is very exciting and scary as well. There are going to be meetings next week about that. I might need to draft some ideas on how to process with the integration, but I hope there won't be a quizz until I have been briefed about what exactly is it that we are dealing with.

And to top it all, I have now watcher in five items, two watchers in one item and a bid in one item :j. That is so much better than I expected.

I was going to write about stress into my blog but that has to wait until tomorrow. I am pooped. Little bit of stitching and then bed for me.

If you have done those little exercises you will now have three pieces of paper. Have a look at them all together. Can you see patterns? Are all the lists completely different. For example if your heart's desire is to become a published author, did you do any writing during your perfect day? If what makes your family tick is to have mummy home a bit earlier to spend quality time with kids (or daddy) then is this more important than achieving something that is on that first list. Have a good critical look at your lists and see how compatable they are. I will come back to this exercise once more but I think some sleep first is in order.