Right here and now

So what do you say?

The long week is over. I've gone to the store, the bank, gassed up my car, and made it home to get the laundry and dinner started. I say let's jump start this three day weekend! Time to en---joy the time laid out before me. Let me get in a few miles running, a few words put down on documents, a little this and that. What do I say?

No time like the gift we have right now...ahhh, the present.
TT

Stop, start

I'm feeling a little rushed. It's a hurry up and wait sort of situation. Too much going on here, not enough going on there. It's a stop, start, go, pause, hold, now, later sort of feeling.

It will straighten itself out.
TT

Everyday weekend

It was a good weekend. There was nothing out of the ordinary or any great plans that were arranged and completed. It flowed rather well. There was some really good weather and somehow it was a couple of days where everything fell into line in the proper order.

I finished that throw I crocheted out of all the leftover balls of yarn I had lying around. It was a good use of yarn and my time. It's an odd mix of colors that almost looks like it came from Peru but it's done. There was some time used for cleaning up. I even got out there and ran a few miles each morning and even started getting the backyard flower bed cleaned out.

Production started.
TT

Avoiding the void

I will get out of work an hour early today and get at least that much time to jump start my weekend. I've been trying to figure out the best use of that time so it doesn't go down the great void that can turn into my free afternoon. It's a shame I have to view it that way but the reality and chances of it being gobbled up into a waste of free time is all too recurring.

Did you get all that? I have a tendency to waste a lot of extra free time. It wouldn't be so bad if I didn't' subsequently turn around and complain about the lack of time. Aha! Another reality! I'm the culprit, the one to blame, the complainer of all things time related, at least lately.😜

So no complaints this time. I don't need another recap full of time-related themes. I'm not sure how this won't qualify but it's the road I've chosen for today. I have all morning to plot and plan the activities of this afternoon to avoid any voids, to power through any lack of activities, to make a difference in the free hour I have to begin this weekend. Let me check the list I already started in case of this such an emergency. I can work from there.

You know things are getting tough when a free hour has to be plotted.

TT

Time to recap

I had to go back and recap since the end of January. After reading all my recent posts since that time I can sum them up fairly quickly. Here are the main thoughts:

• January is over and time moved quickly
• I didn't care for the article I read on stillness techniques to quiet all the bombarding thoughts in my head
• We had some bad weather
• I took a day off
• Time passes quickly again
• More about time

I'm not sure the obsession about time lately but it's a recurring theme that is getting tired and overworked. Give it a break, already.

TT

Snails and Ants

There have been many hours in this week. For some reason they seemed to have stretched in length. I know it's the same, exact amount as any other week but the feeling is I've managed more in the same stretch of time.

I think it's bizarre when you have less to do, fewer tasks to perform, the week can drag to a snails pace making it seem incredibly long. When my tasks increase and I am focused on a project, no matter how difficult or simple, the time speeds to a trail of worker ants along a sidewalk. There is more done in the same amount of time but it flies by.

That's a good thing.
TT

Look away, focus forward

Do you see what happens when you look away for just a minute?

BOOM! Days pass by and you get so caught up in the day-to-day you don't realize it's gone until you sit again and take account. Where did the last few days of January happen to go? I did a few things, I moved around, I got myself from here to there, and landed just in time to look up to see where I am.

I think that is how it works. Don't look back, that's not the way you are going. Look ahead, go forward, live it now, and all that stuff is the way they say to keep on.

My early morning co-worker retired yesterday. She handed over her laptop and security badge, she cleaned out her desk and said many goodbyes. She won't be coming into work this morning. I bet she erased her alarm from going off.

It will all happen in good time. Just look away for a few more minutes.
TT

Meet for coffee?

The day starts a little later when you don't have to rush off to work.

I have an appointment at 8:45am this morning so I took the opportunity to give myself a vacation day and a long weekend. I have the day off once I fulfill my scheduled engagement. Can you call a routine doctors appoint an engagement? I just did. And I also used it as a reason for not showing up to work so it sounds good to me.

I might stop off for coffee on my way home. I think that sounds like a fun and quiet way to spend a few moments. You can picture it. Ordering a simple black coffee so you don't have to wait around until someone else mixes it up and calls your name when it's ready. It's an easy order, pay, and find a small table in a less traffic area of the cramped room. Sit and breathe it all in. Pull out your eReader and figure out how the author went from sugar-sweet nice to beasty mean. You have to keep reading to see how it all flows together or check back to see if it's a writing team instead of one author that has different writing styles. But the moment isn't lost and the alone time surrounded by others feels pretty okay on a Friday mid-morning.

I might take that time to figure out the rest of the day or just leave it to chance. Either way I don't have to think about that now.
TT

Boring Weather

We could talk about the weather.

This happens more in winter than any other time of the year. It's due to the fact that I don't care for it - the colder temperatures, the rain mixed with wind, the overall feeling I might not make it from the house to my car without losing a few fingers to hypothermia. Okay, that might be a little drastic but you get the general idea of how little this season means to me or should I say how much? I sure talk more about it more than any other season but then I hear others giving summer a bad rap. I guess it's all fair play although boring.

Give it a minute, it will change. Be open to the different experiences it can provide. If you know the run in the winter is going to cause all the unpleasantness I could possibly imagine than find another way to go for a run. There are other options. And thinking about the other options can give another perspective on how you look at that same thing. Change the camera angle and you'll get a different picture of the same landscape. It might even get you to think of the same things in a way you hadn't thought about before.

Then it isn't boring.
TT

Agitated Stillness

What would life be without a thought in your head? Empty-headed. Devoid of thought. Still.

I'm not sure if that sounds all that good. I read an article about finding your stillness. The theme of the article is when things start spinning in our heads we should pause, sit back, settle into what is happening and work with what we are thinking. The article said to concentrate on what was causing the thoughts, access how they are making us feel, calmly let them sit inside us. It suggested to face what we are thinking at that moment and find some gratitude and compassion and then give yourself permission to go back to your day to day.

Yikes. That is a whole lot of thinking. It sounds pretty counter-intuitive to think so much if what you are trying to do is settle down and clear your head. Why not just pause and stop. Why all the self analysis. Do I need to have a list of things I need to think about when I'm thinking so hard I can't stop thinking? How am I supposed to remember the steps and what am I to think about next when I already have too many things to think about.

I thought this pausing, calming, meditation type thing is supposed to be less imposing. It sounds like a lot of work to me and I don't think I can remember all the things I'm supposed to think about when I do it. That could cause even more anxiety over all the things I'm already thinking.

If I want to clear my head I think I will just take a break. I will distract myself with something else, take on a different chore, go for a run. Don't think so hard. That seems to be an easier mantra to remember when there is too much going on in my head.
TT

Make it bold

Don't blink twice or this month might be over. I've been marking little forward slashes across the numbers of the calendar and it looks like it's picked up a rhythm. Some slashes started out small but as we march along through the month they have become progressively larger and bolder.

Can't do anything about those days with the slashes. Can't look back and don't have the time to wonder what I did with them. I can work with the ones still to come and concentrate on today. I can do what I can with right now and work on it to make those slashes bold today so I'm not thinking about yesterday. Besides.

It will all be filled if you blink...twice.

TT

Weekly recap

Here is the lesson from this past week. 

It seems that no matter how well you brainstorm ideas to spend a productive batch of time it will naturally be taken over by life. Some priorities will be pushed aside no matter what you have going on. The key is to ride it on through because different things can happen if you don't try to hold any course too tightly.

There was certainly no pressure on the holiday where extra time was spent doing whatever came to mind. I did fill extra batches of time doing something I hadn't done before. There were some things I might not have wished to do but then, I guess, you have to be careful what you wish for.

I know I've heard that said before. Is planning another form of wishing?

TT

P, p, and p

I didn't exactly kick-start a new routine. It was slightly altered naturally by having my car in the shop for the entirety of the work week. Parts, promises, and paying utterly astonishing amounts to do about half the work was the frustrating name of the game. The routine changes were the rides I had to arrange and scheduling that needed to be done to get me from point A to point B without the aid of my own vehicle.

It's done. Well, half of it, but the important parts are done. The want-to-have-done's aren't that important and can wait until I've settled myself down and no longer feel as if I've overstepped my welcome on securing a ride.

So now I have my car back and I have the weekend. Everything is back in balance, including the checkbook. It's time to get down to some serious free time activity.
TT

Less Boredom

Brainstorming. A process of making a list of ideas to solve a problem.

I should be good at this. I make lists all the time! I used to make lists for all the many things I had to do to keep them in priority order. Now it's more a tool so I don't forget to do the things that are important. Either way, I guess I could use a little brainstorming session to come up with some creative ideas of how to break up a mundane routine. I need to come up with a list of things to do after work so I don't continually waste hour blocks of time. And some kind of fun should be involved since it is my after-hours. That shouldn't be too hard since my ideas of fun don't always match up to the normal ideas of fun. Sometimes my fun might be considered work by others but it's all in the perspective. It should be a no brainer and I could have an enormous list of items in no time at all.

I can get into this process. I can solve that problem, err, except it isn't really a problem. Is not knowing what to do with your extra time after your boring routine a problem? It is if you continue to be bored.
TT

Last Weeks Recap

I've gone though my posts for last week and the general consensus seems to be I'm preoccupied with the future. Plan this and plan that...don't take a day off to do nothing because it isn't in the plan. If I'm not careful the things I do now won't add up to the resounding plan I have for the finale that has built itself in my mind if I don't stay on track. That is even if I know it won't turn out as imagined no matter what I do (or plan). I also reused words like overlay and hum-drum. It's been quite a week!

I do think it's a good idea to change things up a little. The routine is a little worn and could use some revitalizing. I'm making efforts to not be so boring. I baked cinnamon rolls from scratch yesterday afternoon and that was something I hadn't done in many years and it wasn't planned. They came out pretty well and it seems I can still bake.

Maybe baking cinnamon rolls is still boring but at least it was different. It made the house smell wonderful and it's a start in a new direction of wherever it's supposed to go or not go. If it can lead me on to something that will spark another idea of different and various things to do in my present instead of waiting around for an unknown future then it's a good thing.

And I'll try to avoid using the words overlay and hum-drum.
TT

Ideas for Change?

I need to shake things up (again). It's time to change a few routines that can be changed. The time for a few slight adjustments to the mundane routines are in order.

I've become so focused on my crusade to get my business in order that now it's well on its way I've become stagnant. Hum-drum is the name of my game lately and that needs to change even if it is only a slight shift in what I do. How predictable can one person be? How far can I take my adherence to my everyday routines? If someone was watching my daily life they would be able to plot my path with tremendous accuracy since I never waver or shift. You would be able to overlay any day in my life and that day would match up exactly to any other random day. I don't have to worry about anyone charting my days but maybe it's time to shake it up even if just a little. 

That means I need to come up with new ideas on how to change things around and that might take a while. Let me think about it as I go off to my regular routine.

TT

Get the blinker to work

I finally made that appointment to take my car in for service. It has been suffering from some minor clinks and misses for a while. Nothing that causes anything but a little grief and aggravation but not enough to make any real difference. The service will be mostly time consuming because it will mean pulling out the dash to get to the radio and a/c controls that don't seem to do what they are meant to do. I also need the blinker to actually stop after I make a turn and not wait for me to manually stop it. I've gotten used to doing it but I'd rather get the car back up to it's regular standards of convenience again.

I don't know what caused me to wait so long to finally call to bring it in but it's all marked in the books for Tuesday morning. I've made all the arrangements. I guess I was going back and forth about whether I should keep the car or make a change at this point. I'm taking all these decisions too much to heart as if they will foil everything if I make the wrong move. It won't but somehow making an appointment for service on the car was something I needed to ponder. Not really.

TT

Predicting the Future

My mind was wandering off into some future that might never happen. I'm sure some of the parameters might be slightly accurate but there isn't any way thinking off into a very distant future can be any where near accurate the way it is imagined. The area might be the same, the walls, the furnishings but to try to place what the situation will be and how others will act in that timeframe is no way predictable.

It's a wonder all these goals and resolutions are put into place year after year by so many that haven't been able to do these things when they try over and again. What's the deal with continually trying to do something that continually doesn't work. Is the blame with the goal or resolution or the person that keeps attempting the same thing the same way.

When my mind was wandering it had nothing to do with goals and resolutions. It's funny how it turned into that conversation at all. It was an easy way to make another point about trying to predict how things will be when you have not the slightest idea. The future is out there and I keep trying to pinpoint it. No go. Not gonna happen. Stay right here where you are today, do what you can, and the future will come when you are ready or not.
TT

Empty complaints

It's hard to believe while in the middle of everyday routines that things could be so good. While I stumble through the hum-drum daily get up and follow all the familiar steps that are retraced day after day it's not easy to remember how very good things have turned out. There isn't really a complaint that could be spoken that would carry any weight due to the mere lack of substance it could contain. It's empty. An empty complaint.

I've actually worried about when to take my car in for service. This day or that. When and what time. What would work out the best. Now, you know things have gotten too good when you are not worried about what might be wrong with the car or how much it will take to fix or what that will mean as far as keeping or getting a new. The only worry is when to take it in?

Empty complaints. 

TT

Fun over Fear

It turns out I somehow missed yesterday. I must have been in massive hibernation because it was one day I can say was a blank, a miss, a didn't take the time to even try to do a thing day. Nothing was accomplished, nothing could be checked off any list, and there isn't any sign of anything happening other than, well, nothing. Is this what taking a day off might really mean?

Depending on what article of fake news you would like to read, what happened could be observed as the absolute wrong way to observe the new year and all the wonderful things you think you need to change about yourself. Those improvements won't happen unless you pay stringent attention to the rules. There is no such thing as a hibernation day, even if it falls on a Sunday and is one of the coldest day of the year. You must stick to the plan!

It might help in these articles if they were at least credible. You could overlay each one, all written by different experts, and see they are all the same. Not one offers anything different or creative. They are all stoked with keywords such as: fear. They like to use that one. It seems if they can evoke that feeling in anyone it can drive motivation or psychotherapy. I think they are going for the last option but mostly they don't tell you anything except that if you want to change to got to figure out why. Well, I'm not sure they say that because if they did, no one would read any of their articles because then you could figured out the best way to get yourself to do anything. Once you figure out why, you have all the motivation you need even if the reason is to have more fun.

I had some fun yesterday while in hibernation all day. I didn't read or think or miss a single thing.
TT