A Reminder to Remember to Embrace Your Inner 3 Year Old.

I'm a big fan of Ted Talks.  I just stumbled upon this really inspiring video of Neil Pasricha titled:  "The Three A's of AWESOME".   (Neil Pasricha is author of THE BOOK OF AWESOME and THE BOOK OF EVEN MORE AWESOME) and watched it while I ate my lunch.  Along with his books, this video emphasizes being mindful and appreciative of the simple things in our everyday lives.  It explains that overall, an attitude adjustment can make a world of a difference in the enrichment of your life.  When life throws us awful news or deals us a terrible hand, there are always two choices to make.  We can either do nothing and dwell on the bad, OR, we can try to have a good attitude in order to push forward.  Watch this video.  You will be happy that you did.  ESPECIALLY if you were having a crappy day.  I promise you it will make you feel better.

Starting now, I am going to end each post with 5 things off of the top of my head that I, in this moment, appreciate, am thankful for, and make me happy.

1. Finding a man who gives me the love I know I deserve.
2. Wearing oversized hoodies
3. The way you can hear and pick out different instruments and voices when listening to music in over-the-ear headphones.
4. I get a super discounted gym membership and my gym is awesome.
5. Flannel sheets (or t-shirt sheets... those are great, too!!)

The Battle Against the Dementors Starts Now.

While Googling various things along the lines of, "How to deal with living with a negative/miserable person", I came across this depression quiz on some psychology website.  I took it.  I was curious.  I've been feeling like total crap as of lately.  Mentally.  Emotionally.  Maybe a tiny bit physically, too.  I scored a 31 on that depression quiz, which apparently meant I could be "mildly/moderately depressed".  That's when it really hit me.  I didn't want to admit it to myself that over the past couple of months I have felt somewhat lifeless.  What?  Me?  Depressed?  No way.  This is not acceptable.

I've been stuck in a rut that I wasn't quite sure I know how to get out of.  I wish there was a syllabus for life.  I mean, what do you expect?  You go to school your entire life.  All you ever know is, "If you do A, B, and C, you will succeed and proceed to the next level.  Good work, young padawan!".  Before you know it you're done with college with only a really expensive piece of paper to show for it.  Then what?  Student loan bills flood your mailbox.  That's what.

If you're anything like me, you're really great at procrastination and the thought of making an actual "adult decision" scares the piss out of you (please see last blog post on procrastination).  I'll admit it.  I'm not proud of it, but I've come to terms with it and I'm doing my best to do something about it.  I've realized that doing nothing is worse than doing literally anything.  I need to start making choices and sticking with it.  I've been too fixated on making the "best choice" for things and as a result I make none.  I've let my A.D.D. get the best of me and jump from one thought to the next instead of actually executing anything.  This applies to most things in my life.

On top of that, I'm still living at home.  I thought it would be a good idea to move back in to save some money.  Sounds good, right?  Eh, not really.  Let me explain.  My mom is miserable.  ....And she loves company.  Often times I walk in the door from work or when I come home from my boyfriend's house after not being home for a few days and am greeted with a black cloud of negativity.  I have noticed that I am letting it have a serious impact on my thoughts and how I feel.  It's hard not to, ya know?  I let her negativity get the best of me and bring me down to that miserable level.  I let the negativity vibes suck the life right out of me.  My mom is a very difficult person.  She is stubborn, has poor eating habits, smokes, never leaves the house (I mean NEVER), makes excuses for everything, and is extremely negative and vocal about it.  When I took that depression test and it gave me my results, I had a moment of realization.  I don't want to grow up and be like my mom.  I don't want my "day-to-day" to be sitting around the house and getting stuck inside my own head with only negative thoughts.  In the words of the captain from Wall-E, "I don't want to survive.  I want to live!".  I don't have plans to live here forever, it's just temporary.  I need to remember that.  My mom is NEVER going to change and I need to do a better job at just accepting that.  I realize that instead I need to change the way I respond.  This is only temporary.  It is taxing sometimes, but temporary.

Now I have to focus on my next move.  I want to get back into shape.  I've had a rough holiday season but I'm not getting anywhere by dwelling on that.  I'm going to look into getting another job that makes me feel good about life.  I think those things are a good start.

Procrastination. The thing I am best at / struggle most with.

My homepage is ZenHabits.net and for good reason.  For anyone reading this, I suggest that you visit that site if you're looking for uplifting, simplistic, yet realistic ways to handle your life.  This is an excerpt out of today's post that honestly couldn't describe my overwhelming procrastination problem better.

• Fear. Procrastination is often about fear — fear of failure, fear of success, self-doubts. But we don’t often know that this fear is even there — we just act on the fear. Fears, once we’re aware of them, can be beaten by the light of day. When we see fears out in the open, in the light, we can see they’ve been overblown in our minds. The worst-case scenario of failure is often not that bad when we really think about it.

(This Calvin and Hobbes panel is the epitome of my life)

For anyone interested, click here for the page of "Best of Zen Habits" posts.  It's a good starting point.