Ridiculous beginnings

It can be helpful simply to make a written or mental list of the things you do each day. Then give yourself a mental credit for each of them, however small. This will help you focus on what you have done instead of what you haven’t gotten around to do. It may sound simplistic, but it works.
David D. Burns

I have worked like an adrenalin imbued automaton for the past few weeks, working through the nights, grabbing perhaps 2-3 hours of sleep a night to get through my insane work and study commitments. This was so that I could hand in three assignments, one of which was due at University this morning.

I had to keep a diary over the past three months reflecting on what I had learnt and in which types of situations I had learnt. I had to keep a record of all of the things I had completed at work as part of the portfolio. It took me hours to prepare all for an ungraded pass or fail subject. In reading the 43 pages of writing, it did make me realise that I had achieved some amazing things during that time at work and that I had initiated some change that had a positive impact both on me and my working environment.

As the Saturday class ended and we were due to hand in the assignment, the lecturer announced that he was going to give everyone an extension of 2 and half weeks, as he had not been able to do all of the workplace practicum observations.

Now, don’t get me wrong, it is great to have it done and only have one assignment left, but I felt so pissed that I had kept to my commitment and he hadn’t. If I was going to be late, I was required to give the lecturer a minimum of a week’s warning for an extension to be given consideration. What a double standard.

Despite this disapointment and anger this afternoon, I notice that I am definitely feeling so much better on the medication that I am on now. I am feeling for the first time in five years the absence of depression. I am not feeling ‘otherness’, sadness or bitnerness. I am feeling tired but very alive.   

Perfectionism becomes a badge of honor with you playing the part of the suffering hero.
David D. Burns

So, what did I learn through the journal exercise that I didn’t discuss in my assignment? I feel compelled to always do the best I can in every situation. In feedback my manager gave me recently he wrote, "Blue is learning the art that you cannot please all of the people all of the time. She is coming to terms with the fact that sometimes there are trade-offs and sometimes shit happens".

Now that I am not feeling constantly depressed, I am noticing the approval seeking part of me emerge like a demon. Perhaps that is because I don’t want to be on my own island any more. I want to feel connectedness with people. I want to experience intimacy, instead of keeping people at arms length so that they didn’t discover just how dark I had been feeling. 

I just don’t know why I am putting in so much energy and commitment to work that I don’t want to have a future in. I think it is time now for me to think about what it is I am supposed to be doing on this earth. With the amount of sustained energy and determination I have demonstrated to myself lately, I know I could be doing something that could have much more impact on my community.

Every man is guilty of all the good he did not do.
Voltaire

Once the academic year ends for me, I am going to try and let down this wall of self discipline and let spontaneity enter into my life. Stop trying to be the poor down trodden hero and just have some fun. 

All great deeds and all great thoughts have a ridiculous beginning. Great works are often born on a street corner or in a restaurant’s revolving door.
Albert Camus