As I alluded to in my first post, not only am I taking my inner workings apart but I’m also in the middle of a major career transition as I’m not going back to the industry I was in for twelve years.
Basically, I’m gutting the entire house all at once because that’s me – I’m an all or nothing kind of gal.
As with any method this has its positives and negatives. Positive: I think career and personal mentality go together like what flooring is to walls – can’t do one without considering the other. Negative: At times, all of this renovation can be a little much because it’s question after question; Does this match this? Is this really useful and necessary or just decorative? What do I really want to use this space for? Which can lead to a question/decision/answer-meltdown (QDA – if you will).
Case in point, in preparing my taxes, I stumbled upon a new portion of the Department of Labor’s website that vaguely indicates my unemployment benefits might be ending in March when I had counted on them until June. Of course I immediately picked up the phone to try to clarify this and conveniently it was President’s Day and the office is closed.
Enter major QDA freakout session of: OMG! Was this a mistake? Maybe this wasn’t the right time for a career transition? Am I going to have to go back to the industry I was so miserable in and have no personal life? But what if they don’t want me back either? In taking an unconventional path am I now considered to be damaged goods? What am I going to do if I can’t pay my rent? Am I being punished for how unconscious I used to be?
QDA! QDA! QDA!!!! With no answers to any of these questions, more questions emerged until it was a long, mutilated chain of stressful interrogation to the point I was waterboarding myself.
By chance, I was trolling yoga articles around this time and found this article:
“The fight or flight mechanism is our inborn, primitive reaction to stressful situations, whether it be internal or external circumstance’s that bring it on. When we feel threatened by anything our nerve cells fire and chemicals such as adrenaline and cortisol (stress hormones) release into our system making our rational mind take the back seat and putting us into an extremely stressful and taxing experience where we either want to run or fight our way out.”
Right! My mind just went berserk because my livelihood is threatened and I want to fight my way out of it. I felt safe when I had a cushion until June. That’s what I’m reacting to here. Dammit! Give me what I WANTED!
And somehow, realizing that, rationale started to sit in…I’m not in dire financial situation. I still have years of savings left. Granted, this is not what I planned and it’s certainly not what I wanted. There’s that word – WANTED!
How many times in life do we react as if we’re in a restaurant, given something we didn’t order and our immediate reaction is to send it back. It’s unacceptable! And into “fight or flight” mode we go…either fight to get what we ordered or, flight, we can’t have what we want so we’re leaving!
A “want” is really an expectation and when family, friends, food orders, kids, significant others, and everyday events fall below the want/expectation, QDA kicks in to fill that gap in the form of, why didn’t it happen and what’s going to be done about it?
We grind away at the course of life when filled with expectation and become tense because we’re either struggling or fleeing in trying to get what we want, and then get to be drained and tired from all this running around as an expectation-filled-wild-banshee.
After the freak out session from QDA meltdown occurred, I was so tired I took a nap. After an hour, refreshed and maybe half unconscious this question floated by, When have I ever been stuck in a dire financial situation that I couldn’t, or didn’t, get myself out of? Uh – never.
I’ve waited tables, worked retail, tutored, had two or three jobs at a time. I can hustle to pull things together when I need to.
And yet again – where did my sense of belief in myself go? Where is my belief and faith in the universe that this is happening for a reason? No matter what, I’m going to be okay because I’ll figure something out. I just don’t know the specifics to that something.
Getting into this space of accepting the circumstances as they are and with the belief that no matter what I’m going to be okay, restored a sense of calmness and ease.
So for now, I’m going to be thankful for what happened because it brought me to a new consciousness of observing and deconstructing my habits in how I react…