Once more, I am participating in A Chronic Voice’s monthly linkup.
January prompts: purging, seizing, opening, revamping, and envisioning
Since January and the new year are so often used by people for fresh starts, I am doing so as well. Even though I wish I had things going strong in January, I usually have the wind knocked out of me one way or another in November and December.
This year is no exception, but as I am over the cold I got in December, I have resolved to work away on myself and get back into the game, so to speak.
Purging myself of fear and self-doubt
For the last 6 months I’ve had an almost constant migraine. The headache pain itself is annoying, but not debilitating. However, it’s accompanied by screen sensitivity(increased headache and fatigue if I look at a TV or computer screen) and occasionally blurry vision. I’ve been a bit stuck with these symptoms, and it has frankly been emotionally exhausting.
This also set off my own fear of failure, idea of being incapable to do the work I want to on my blog and business, and kept me from carrying through on the plans I had made in July.
So, I am now putting energy into purging myself of those fears, creating productive plans for managing future symptoms, and an overall improvement in what I physically do, which often helps me feel emotionally better.
One of my biggest holdups appears to be around earning money from my own work. I’m putting together my first round of sales emails to offer paid support to others, and I’m hoping that that will help me to further shed my own fears and doubts about my capabilities.
I’m hoping that these attempts at self-improvement will stick better and last longer, allowing me to keep improving my life by ridding myself of the older fears and sense of failure that often rears its ugly head.
Seizing back control
While I would like to be doing nothing more than seizing new opportunities and moving myself forward in my life, I must admit that I’m not really feeling that strong at the moment.
I’ve lost almost half a year to a nearly constant migraine, and while the cold I caught in early December seemed to have reduced those symptoms, now that I seem to be healthy again, I’m feeling the migraine seizing hold of my life instead.
It’s a frustrating experience, but one that I’m trying to overcome.
I am now willing to try again, and am working on wresting my life back from the effects from the migraine and the frustration around it.
Opening myself to better opportunities
I have embraced my leadership role within BiRequest and am eagerly putting energy into growing and improving the leadership roles and responsibilities within the group, as well as recruiting newer members to take on leadership responsibilities!
I have also decided that I’ve let this migraine control more than enough of my life lately, and am opening myself up to regaining that self-control and life management that I like to have.
This is expressed a few different ways, some more helpful than others. On the most basic level, I’ve decided that it’s time to focus on productive and radical self-care rather than focus on getting by.
Basically, I’m planning to make sure that I have multiple options for my next steps and that every day, I’m going to get something productive accomplished, when the past few months I’ve been low on drive due to frustration with the state of my life.
Revamping
To that end, I’m trying to revamp my self-care plans and definition of productivity to help me be more productive and feel more successful.
I’m rebuilding my exercise routines
I’m getting back into my meditation habits.
I’m continuing appropriate self-care for managing my migraines.
I’m also finding ways to do more for my business while minimizing my screen time, as I seem to be screen sensitive again.
I like using my computer. I prefer to type things. There’s a lot of work to do that is computer-dependent or more efficient to do by computer.
That’s a big part of why my primary success the last several months has been built around keeping up with my blog posts, but I really hadn’t been able to get much more than that done.
Part of my revamp is refocusing, part is about setting myself up to be successful even with minimal computer usage.
Part of it is keeping myself on track, with a structure, a plan, and a timeline.
So over the next few weeks, that’s where I’m focusing my energy: restarting old good habits and doing my best to find ways to feel successful and productive every day!
Envisioning a lovely future
With everything that’s happened with BiRequest, one of my big focuses is doing everything in my power to help the group to run as smoothly and cooperatively as possible.
I’ll be spending more time in the city to do that, and am committing myself to some additional responsibilities.
I do feel well-supported in this effort and am glad to be putting my energy into this. I just want to make sure that I have the energy I need to work on other pieces of my life too.
I also really would like this blog to shift from being a project to being a business, and while I have visualized ways to do so, I need to work on making those pieces happen – that’s one of the biggest responsibilities of mine that’s fallen through the cracks with this migraine.
So, now, I’m envisioning myself taking all the necessary steps to fix this, one by one – including primarily using computer time to work on this project instead of letting myself be so distracted by games and unproductive social media time(productive social media time is fine)
I’m picturing myself working away at my businesses and services and encourage others to manage the pieces of life that I do have a good handle on: understanding and making decisions about social welfare supports, knowing how to self-advocate with my doctors, and describing my experiences here on this blog.
I’m hoping that I will be free to keep growing and developing all these, giving me the space to live my best possible life!
Love how you’re seizing control in 2020 in a positive way! All the best with the leadership roles, I think you’ll do fabulously. And definitely take it easy and enjoy your days too. Sending lots of love! x
Thanks so much, Sheryl!
I’m going to be co-running a facilitator training on Monday, which we are hoping to use in February or March to train our new facilitators!
Just had an wonderful visit with a friend I hadn’t seen in years, and am now planning to spend the day working on my sales stuff.
I’m definitely keeping planned time for social and fun things, never fear, I just am working on making my days at home more productive!
Thanks so much for doing this linkup!
It sounds like you have a lot of responsibility and opportunities starting in 2020. Its great you already know where you want to focus your energy and are cultivating ways to feel successful and productive every day!
Niamh,
Thanks so much! I’m glad I have a sense of what I want and don’t want out of life, it helps me to focus and stay focused.
Hope things are becoming more manageable for you as well!
Thank you for sharing such insights! I especially love the part about revamping self-care routines! It’s so important to take a look at those things every once in a while and see what changes we can make for the better.
Revamping plans is something I have read about in a lot of planning/self-improvement things I see and read. I have learned the hard way that I don’t have the spoons to constantly shift them or to always think about them, so instead I have a base set of habits I aim for and will ocasionally fine-tune one bit or another to better meet my current needs. It is really important though to be aware that I can adjust them as needed, though. Hope you are doing well with your own healthy patterns and habits!