Over at Making a Living Writing, Carol Tice posted on How to Eliminate All Your Freelance Writing Obstacles. She questions, does it seem overwhelming, too hard? These questions are not only for freelance writers. They are universal to challenging, valuable pursuits, and so is the prescription.
She opens with a Yiddish folktale, which is well worth a minute to read. Then her suggestion: change your attitude. To get perspective on the obstacles in your life, list what you have going for you. As the first commenter said, it's just in time for Thanksgiving.
I don't think it directly addresses the feeling that something is overwhelming, but it does make one feel better to take stock of good things. Feeling happier can make difficult things seem more approachable.
Here's my gratitude list:- Wonderful, supportive boyfriend who adores me
- I'm in the best shape of my life
- My mom may have health and potential financial issues, but she's still alive and in good mental health
- I have a large, loving family
- Even if it is occasionally stretched by unexpected expenses, my boyfriend and I both have secure income
- I'm going to be an aunt for the first time in January, and two of my closest friends are having babies around the same time
- Everyone believes I have a bright future and many of them gladly help me along the way
- I have affordable basic healthcare
What's on your list?
Not-work has been excellent the last few months, especially regarding exercise. Except biking. I've slacked in biking. Gotta fix that.
But I have a good reason that I haven't biked as much. Several, in fact.
I've attended every possible jujitsu practice save one when I was sick in early February. I spent most of the semester teaching lower belts the basics. As the end of the semester approached, I asked J-man (aka sensei) if I should test for green tip or green belt. He confidently said green belt. Green is the last step below brown and the first color that the home dojo recognizes. I wasn't sure I was prepared for that since I'd missed so many new techniques while teaching newbs, but I trusted his judgement.
My fellow (former) blue belts and I practiced a bunch to prepare for the belt test. Green is a rough test. Suffice it to say that I had a lot of weight driving me into the ground and flew through the air somewhere between waist and chest level. All that practice ended in a sprained ankle right before the test. I hopped up on only my left foot after my first few landings. Sensei asked if I was okay and I said, "I'll be fine." No way am I giving up on the test for a sore ankle!
After a few more landings he stopped me from receiving throws and only had me demonstrate that I could execute the techniques. Our work and perseverance paid off and we all passed. Unfortunately I have to cut out parts of my training for a month or so until the ankle fully heals. Rest assured, I have plenty to work on that don't stress my ankle.
I've also started a new exercise routine outside jujitsu. J-man introduced me to an excellent sports trainer in a city a couple of hours away. Every four to six weeks the trainer gives me a new workout routine geared specifically toward my physical imbalances and goals. For example, my lower back and shoulders are exceptionally flexible. While that is not a bad thing in itself, it leaves me more vulnerable to instability in those areas. The trainer gives me exercises to correct for that. The workouts are challenging and very doable. I can feel and see the results, which is satisfying and a nice change from the murky path of research. I never thought I'd like working out at a gym.
Among other things I never expected is J-man, of course. We've been dating for about six and a half months and it has been so good for me. Not only has he supported me through professional and personal struggles and gotten me to work out regularly, but he can cook! And I mean well. Pasta primavera, pad Thai, pork loin--all of it has been tasty. He roasts coffee, grinds flour, makes yogurt, and bakes fresh bread. The only thing he doesn't do is rhubarb, but I'm working on that ;). He recently admitted that rhubarb crisp is tasty.
In light of that delicious thought, I'm off to the gym. Food tastes so much better when I'm ravenous after a good workout. That wouldn't skew my opinion of J-man's cooking prowess, would it?
My dad's brain tumor is cancerous and fast-growing. The surgery removed most of it. He went home from the hospital last Saturday and found out the basic diagnosis on Wednesday. He has an appointment next Tuesday to get the details and lay out treatment. I'm hoping for relatively good news and not bothering to prepare for bad news because I don't see any way to do that.
I live in a soap opera (but it's so much more than that).
My sudden absence again was due to a family camping trip. Besides the dead car battery in the middle of the trip, it was rather unexciting: two days of driving for four days of camping. I did enjoy getting out of town for a bit and getting some reading done.
During the four days of actual camping, I read quite a bit. I finished a book about scientist-mothers, Motherhood, the Elephant in the Laboratory. While I probably won't do actual lab work, these mothers' stories contain useful compromises and warnings for my future. Between that and Mama, PhD, I've gotten a good reality check on the benefits and challenges of career and family. I highly recommend both of them.
I have not, in fact, disappeared off the face of the Earth. I just finished my seminar and a literature review for an NSF-style proposal that is the semester project for my class.
The seminar is an oddly justifiable and valuable means of torture. I spent three weeks working 12-15 hours most days leading up to the seminar. The house went to hell, my sleep went to hell, and I may have told the kitties to go to hell at some point.
I've never been very comfortable speaking to large groups, nor very good at it. Somehow, this seminar was amazingly successful. I got good ratings from the group at large and a couple of people even commented that it would shame most conference talks and many invited seminars. Maybe I can do this scientist thing after all.
After all the stress of preparing the seminar, studying for the qual, and immediately having to write a literature review for my class (due today), I am again questioning my intended career path. A large research university seems to fit my skills and interests best as far as the balance between teaching and research, but I'm not sure I want the pressure to perform and publish that comes with that job.
I still want to teach and do research, so I don't think I want to work at a teaching university. (I understand that professors at teaching universities still do research, but I think I'd rather it be a more explicit and significant part of my job.) I don't want to be a researcher because that tends to remove teaching. Maybe a researcher who does a lot of outreach? Or maybe I can still do this professor thing after all, too.
How does grad school compare to being a professor as far as stress and time consumption? And where's that advisor of mine?
This semester it is especially important for me to find stress relief. I don't feel unusually stressed (yet), but I have a tendency to not realize how stressed I am until I'm strained beyond easy remedy. It takes days to recover.
I've also finally found enough incentive to get some exercise, mostly to strengthen my shoulder area. Exercise for the purpose of exercise has never appealed to me. As a result, I've never been able to stick with an exercise program or even to classes.
You may guess, rightly, that these goals can intersect. It's been a twisted path to figuring out what may work for me. I considered a work-out buddy and forcing myself into a gym, drop-in classes at the campus rec center, and looked around my office for suitable weights to lift. I haven't completely discounted the last one, but the others would never stick. What other options are there?
Thanks to an officemate, I may have come up with the perfect upper-body supplement to the lower-body and cardiovascular exercise of skating and biking. I've done it before, enjoyed it immensely, but never though about doing it consistently because of cost. The campus rec center opened a new facility that will make it very affordable (assuming they don't jack up the prices as demand increases). Can you guess what it is yet?
It's rock climbing. Well, wall climbing to be more accurate. I know I'm not supposed to pull myself up with my arms. I'm not looking to do pull-ups all the way up the wall. But it takes the exact kind of strength I'm trying to build to keep myself on the wall.
Maybe I can even convince the boyfriend to go ;).
