self-improvement – Cloverness

It was freeing at first. Bad weather, and I didn’t force myself to go out for errands to both tick a task and complete a high number of exercise minutes. Or to do it the next day. The errands weren’t urgent, and I didn’t feel like it. I could go to bed when I was tired, without guilt, regardless of what had been achieved that day.

The attempt to get up later than the usual 5am has not been very fruitful. I did not get up as early, however it has not yet managed to be restful. There was an annoyance with my phone’s sleep focus that I’ve only just now found a way around, and guilt about my cat having to wait a bit more for her breakfast. Also, that pesky internal clock is not enjoying derogating to its habits. It’ll take some time.

I also suddenly felt like I had so much free time in my day! Things are so much more fun when there are no expectations. Inspiration rushed in and I did sit down and draw.

So the first few days were a breeze. A nice little vacation that made me think, “I can do that all month, no problem!”

And then guilt and perfectionism saw the space wide open and invited themselves in.

(Not really, they both know they each have a guest room ready, they just also invaded the living room and the kitchen)

It felt fairly subtle, actually. The urges to create were replaced by wasting time on social media and obsessively playing spider solitaire on my phone. Having YouTube videos of people playing games I know by heart just to have unending, background noise droning on, instead of things that engaged me.

The sudden thought that I could be doing something better – with the underlying meaning of “productive” – with my time popped more and more often in my mind, and the awareness of all the things I knew needed doing made that worse.

Then I started to miss the “productive” day high. Clean kitchen, fridge stocked with prepped food, errands done, tasks checked off. And the guilt of not doing my “best” every day.

I’d shared my lowering of my expectations of myself with some of the people closest to me. Not to force any accountability, because it never crossed my mind that I could need any. But suddenly I was thinking, “I could just start up again like normal and not tell anyone”.

Which is very much a red flag. Why would I need to hide this from anyone? Why even feel the need to hide it?

Rationally, I know that it’s a detoxing of sorts and that a week is not enough to be effective. And very fortunately, though evidently not foolproof, I’ve become quite good at coaching myself out of behaviours that don’t serve me. So, as terribly uncomfortable as it has been, I’m continuing with what I’ve started.

There will be some changes though. While at first it felt like anything was possible, including activities previously part of my dailies, at some point “I don’t have to do it” got some of its wires crossed with “I just won’t do it”. This is a time to do away with guilt, not with doing things. I can get up at 5 if I want to, and take an hour-long walk.

This is going to require listening more intently to myself, but challenge accepted.

Correcting course and carrying on!

I finally finished a first book for this year, on February 20th…!

The challenges were manyfold.

First, outside of my control, a death in the family, stomach flu, and more recently a stomach bug, all of which consumed a lot of energy and focus.

Then partly within my control, the format I was reading it in. The issue with digital is that while it’s practical when in transit (of which there has been a lot since the start of the year), it’s best to avoid screens right before bed. Which is sadly the time I’ve left this daily task to far too often. Instead, I would read a section of Dr Brené Brown’s Atlas Of The Heart, in a physical format. Which while still being both actually reading, and worthwhile reading, wasn’t furthering my goal of finishing The Art of Learning.

And finally, completely within my control : just plain not taking the time. Choosing to do other things on my phone while in transit. While on my exercise bike.

Though somewhat disappointed that I didn’t properly show up for myself, still, it’s read! Some thoughts on it :

Narratively, as we follow the author’s journey through competing in chess then in martial arts, it was pretty interesting and compelling, even though the technical subtleties were often lost on me in my lack of knowledge of both those activities.
The reflexes of the author to reflect on their process, thought patterns, and how they handled emotion were both very relatable and inspiring. This is something I’ve come to do naturally and am always striving to improve on, especially working WITH emotions, and not against them.
At one point, I felt that I wasn’t actually the intended audience for this book. As the author’s journey is focused on competition and on their pursuit of the best possible performance, it contrasts pretty heavily with my current approach to learning, which is relaxed and utterly non-competitive. However, after a short while of this sentiment, I realized that there were still valuable lessons to be gained from that perspective and from the journey itself, even if my aim was not to that level.
I’ve known it for a while, but once again it hammered in the fact that failure is part of the process of learning. As unpleasant as it’s become to me. The author frames it as “investing in loss”, which while, again, is an expression rooted in competition, is nonetheless a positive way to see it.
The concept of practicing until something becomes so deeply ingrained in one’s brain that it comes without thinking reminded me how it can also be lost without practice. That is a concern I have with drawing – while it used to be a daily and intensive part of my life, I’ve lost a lot of the skills I had internalized to that sort of level. And there aren’t that many ways to regain them.
It has renewed my interest in trying out Tai Chi (one of the focus of the author’s journey), not as a competition, but as a physical and spiritual practice. I have yet to act on it, as time constraints and concerns about energy expenditures have made it tricky to coordinate. But it’ll be possible eventually 🙂

All in all a worthwhile read for me. I will now invest in the “loss” of not having met my goal of finishing it within the month of January and, more conscious of the challenges I faced, I will course-correct and make hopefully better choices 🙂

Wishing you a blissfully quiet February!

Tag: self-improvement

Lowered expectations : a week later

The Art of Learning, by Josh Waitzkin