STuFfeD: self-care 101

When it comes to behavior patterns, when one believes their goodness comes from external means, this opens up to a variety of choices that align with either compliance (to adapt to), defiance (refusal to adapt to), or a disingenuous split likened to a contrived manipulation.

The familiar pattern can still show up, but it feels far away. There is space. I notice it. I even engage with it. It doesn’t consume me like it used to. I am in charge even when I allow the pattern to play. I am super curious about patterns of behavior so I watch it. I learn from it. I also talk to myself the same way an adoring adult would talk to a beloved child or pet. I know it will exhaust itself, and I will grow in away that continues to sustain a healthy sense of wellbeing.

The inside world is connected to the nonphysical. The Something More. The essence of wellbeing and possibility. This is your guidance. This is your intuition. We disempower our own self when we focus on the external projection as the mastermind of our value and worth. When we rely on observable measures for approval, we create a split from our true identity. Split energy leaves us disconnected from the source of our wellbeing.

I have told the story (on some platform) of the moment-capture I had with my youngest nephew after we spent a full day celebrating my mom’s 80th birthday. He must have been four and a half. I found myself upstairs with both my nephews sitting cross legged with them on top of the pull out couch. They had just gotten into their pajamas and were snuggling into some milk and a show to chill out before bed. All my nephew said quietly to himself, as he was about to take a sip of his milk with his eyes on the screen, was “happy”. I think I remember it because it captured exactly what I was feeling. It was a simple moment. He labeled it: happy. No more. No less. Just right. 

Slowing down to return to your own sense of balance and equilibrium is a good idea. This is self-regulation. If one is not familiar with a regulated state, what does one regulate to?

When we see in ourselves that which is vulnerable, that which can improve, that which is not satisfying and is contributing to lagging outcomes in day – we can connect to the other in a way that is not personal. 

☀️☕️ Lagging a bit on the topic for this month. Sticking to the January 2021 proposal of monthly themes based on behavior skillsets I learned on the job. See this blog for more ‘deets’. Behavior is a beast. Oh how ‘we’ want to quantify and control it. Oh how ‘we’ want to make our own…

I have 111 posts. 

I like numbers. I notice the time on my phone. The time on my dashboard. When it is aligned I notice. It’s fun to feel the something more. As a thinking human I get to tell the story about aligned numbers. The story I tell only needs to resonate with me. 

This morning I was going to repost the first blog post of 2021. Last month, I completed the nine Executive Functions I referenced in that first post.

My favorite social app is Instagram. I have 200 followers. I post a video Sunday night and a blogquote midweek. I have momentum in the content, so I mostly ride the wave with a moderate, consistent level of  self-satisfaction. It feels good. Every now and then I fall off the wave and entertain self-doubt, and maybe even embarrassment when I consider the way I feel compared to the observable data. And then I get a special comment or like from someone I admire, and it goes away.

Ideas that popularize do not appear in an instant. Not ideas that lead to meaningful shifts and a broadened paradigm of collective reasoning. Someone, manyone, reference the analogy of a seed planted and the time it takes for that seed to reach the surface; and then from there to grow into itself and share the abundance of goodness that was coded into the original seed.