For the better part of a couple years, particularly in the last few months, I've felt utterly inert. Stuck as fuck. Like I'm hip high in thick sludge and it's so damn exhausting to even try to move, I opt for stillness instead. And I've spent a considerable amount of commutes marinating on why this might be, not only the why but the how.
It's on one hand incredibly shitty of me to see myself as stuck. I am a mother of a 2 year old boy. The sheer fact that he's alive, healthy, and smiling most of the time should leave me poised for some sort of medal. Or at the very least a very moist cookie. Let alone that I shower upwards of twice a week, never miss a floss, and manage to cram a plethora of vegetables into my all too active mouth. And I work a lot. I deserve all the medals and all the cookies. As most of us do. Especially parents.
And on the other hand it's entirely necessary and partially true that I am inert. I dance between my desire to be present and absorb more detail in an incredibly fast paced world, with the insatiable urge to propel forward and be bold and make money and impress myself. And so I've opted for gratitude and perspective mixed with dissatisfaction and irritation. A very bittersweet cocktail showcasing complacency and discontent.
I've trickled out a few written pieces in the last few years. A few. In a few. Pathetic. I am a passionate and dedicated yoga teacher. I am fortunate to teach 5 full public classes a week in Los Angeles, mostly Yin and Restorative. I get to teach people in recovery. I get to share Yoga with people overcoming trauma. I am so fucking lucky. And I love what I do deeply. It fills my cup in a way that no one and no thing (not even motherhood. what the fuck am I saying, definitely not motherhood) can.
So why, then, despite being in charge of the well-being of a tiny human while also attempting to earn what money I can sharing Yoga can I give myself more than 5 minutes to feel okay? To feel at home and at peace with my daily contributions? Because I'm a gemini? Apparently geminis are never satisfied and are allergic to boredom. Great. Because I'm a woman and it's not entirely celebrated to go easy and truly love yourself?
Excuses. All bullshit excuses. I need to think less and act more. And that's what I started to do.
I'm great at thinking about why something might not workout, why odds are stacked against me, or why I'm not quite ready or worthy of something big I desire. It keeps me in that safe space drinking my complacency discontent cocktail. Apparently I'm slightly addicted to that little burn in my throat that reminds me I'm afraid of success. And since as a now veteran teacher I know that my mind creates problems that never existed and exacerbates rather than solves the ones that do, I am relying on my body, heart and gut, instead of my thoughts.
We wait for motivation to work-out. We wait for New Years to eat healthy, quit smoking. We wait until we save enough money from the job we hate to take a leap into a job we love. We hole ourselves up afraid of rejection until we read a story about some sad sack dying alone and no one noticed until the smell left them no other choices and THEN we swipe right once or twice on Tinder. We have a long list of shit we plan to do on some arbitrary date or until some majestic mood we've never felt miraculously appears and then we'll act. No. More.
Mood follows action, not the other way around. I learned this listening to Rich Roll speak on a podcast (You Made It Weird!). If you get off your ass and take a walk and then stretch your body a bit, guess what? You'll feel fucking fantastic. If you drink a bunch of water over soda? Feelin great. One less slice of pizza, a few more servings of vegetables? The happiest poop on earth. Sit down to write even if no ideas appear? Ideas will appear. Put yourself out there/be vulnerable/take a risk? You'll feel like a fucking superhero, whether you succeed or fail. The very act being courageous is incredibly inspiring and satisfying in and of itself.
We learn throughout adulthood that life is rife with pain and failure and rejection, so what the fuck is the point of being inert? It does not avoid any of these inevitable struggles, it swallows up time at an exponential rate. MOVE. ASK. DANCE. QUIT. TRY. ACT. LOVE.
So this silly little piece that only occasionally makes sense is my attempt at getting unstuck. I've got an updated website and resume, new business cards on the way, several irons in the fire, and nothing has come to any sort of fruition yet. But guess what? I feel really fucking good.
We're all a mixture of some admirable qualities and some not so redeemable habits and thoughts. All of us. The task is not to transcend that reality but to embrace it and use it as fuel moving forward. I am weird as fuck. The longer I live the deeper that truth sinks in. And the more I dig that and recognize the weirdos in my life are the best fucking goof troop there is. I earned them and they me. Embrace your complexity and who you are at the core.
There's never a perfect time, perfect place, perfect haircut, perfect amount of income, perfect level of accomplishment, or even a perfect rock bottom to ignite a shift. We must just keep inching forward whether we know what the fuck we're doing or not. We figure it out along the way and we overcome those insidious fears and shitty little doubts every single day until we look back and go holy shit, look how far I've come.
ACT AND YOUR MOOD WILL FOLLOW.
Ready. Set. GO.