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30 Day Challenge – Day 19 – watch out for Compare and Despair

27 Friday Jul 2012

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We all do it sometimes – we look at what someone else is doing and we get all worked up.  They’re doing it better, faster, more creatively.  They’re younger – or older and wiser – or cuter, more eloquent, and more talented.  They don’t seem to make any mistakes.  They have it all together.

Wow.  Can you see that this is so not helpful?  Check how your body feels when you get yourself in compare and despair mode.  Does it feel delicious or horrible?  Does it get you motivated or make you want to curl up in a ball under the covers?

Now, take a minute to focus on  your own life.  Your own accomplishments.  Your own progress.  How you look from the outside to other people. Go ahead and make a list of some of the cool stuff you’re working on, that you’ve completed, that makes you loveable, fun, fast, talented, creative, eloquent and fabulous.  Wow.  You’re pretty amazing!

My challenge update: I got up early for grass time, and papers are in good shape. Early grass time meant I got to see our resident turtle – I can’t believe how often I see her now!  She was cruising along – crossed the yard and then settled into a clump of Mexican petunias, where no one would ever know she was there.  Turtles can make progress with their deliberate little steps!

Have a great weekend and celebrate your own progress!

30 Day Challenge- Day 18 – when routines shift

26 Thursday Jul 2012

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So you’re going along just fine with your new habit – you even made it through the doldrums!  And then your schedule shifts.  There’s a trip, or a special occasion, an illness, or a really really busy day.

What do you do?  Do you go ahead and skip a day?  If you do skip a day, does your silly little lizard tell you you have to start over, like life is some game of Candyland or Chutes and Ladders?  Does your mind want you to go back to “go” – and not give you any credit for what you’ve done so far?  Does your mind make it mean that you’re a failure – does it say, “See?  I told you you wouldn’t be able to pull this off.”

Well, if you do find yourself skipping a day, remember that you don’t need to believe any of that ridiculousness tossed out by your mind.  And that’s what it is.  It’s not true and it’s not helpful. Remind yourself of that.

And maybe you don’t have to skip a day.  Maybe you do the thing you’ve been working on at the end of the day.  Maybe you break it into a bunch of pieces.  Maybe you shift things slightly, but not all the way back to the way they were before you started your great new habit.

I’m hosting a retreat this weekend – a beautiful getaway for a small group of women seeking clarity and connection.  I’ve been busy today getting ready, and I’ll be away from home for the next three days.  So I’ve been thinking about how I’m going to stick with my routines.  30 minutes of drawing and 10 minutes of silent time in nature will be no problem – they’re practically built into the retreat.  I’ll skip my ten minutes on the paper maintenance since I’ll be away, and maybe add a few minutes on to paper management in the coming week.  Having a plan for a shift in routine really helps!

Today I let my inner 8-year-old come out and I just played with colors.  I didn’t want to think about drawing, or value, or tone.  I just doodled.  Remember how soothing it was to decorate your notebooks in school?  That’s how today felt.  Drawing hundreds of hearts over and over for about 15 minutes was almost like repeating a mantra.  Then I filled a page with colorful geometric shapes, trying to make it a game, making up rules for what the next shape or color or size would be, without focus on balance or composition.  Just pure play.  They look coolish when I keep them really small.

Grass time happened really late in the day today.  I had a lot of errands to run and coaching appointments this morning.  The gift of enjoying grass time late, still with a loyal cat by my side, was noticing the beautiful sky at sunset.  I’ve learned to ignore the vast number of power lines and the giant transformer and power pole when I look at the sky — the camera has more difficulty editing it out.  See if you can focus on the sunset instead of the electrical paraphernalia.

Keep paying attention to the thoughts you have, especially if you skip a day.  Remember, you don’t have to believe them.  Just start again tomorrow.  Don’t let your mind make a federal case out of it.  Really.  It’s kind of like the sky and the powerlines.  Which one do you want to focus on?

30 Day Challenge Day 8 – Black and White or Shades of Grey?

16 Monday Jul 2012

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Say you skip a day accidentally or on purpose with something you’ve been meaning to stick to – a diet, an exercise plan, a 30 Day Challenge…

What does your mind do?  Does it immediately go into Chicken Little “OH MY GOD!!! THE SKY IS FALLING!!!” mode?  Does it tell you you’re a failure?  Does it tell you to go back to square one – to start over – that anything you did up to this point, no matter how many days in a row, DOES NOT COUNT because you missed a day?

That, my friends, is called black and white thinking.  And according to Martha Beck in The Four Day Win, it’s one of the hallmarks of people who have trouble losing weight (or organizing their lives, managing their time, and taming their paper piles!)  It is however, curable, thank goodness.  It’s all about recognizing those thoughts.  You just have to watch your cute little Chicken Little mind and tell it to calm down.  You’ve got this.  One slice of pie or missed yoga class or unattended junk mail stack is not going to bring you down.  You will keep going.  You will be fine.   You will teach your mind to see shades of grey.  All is definitely not lost.

So far I haven’t missed a day.  I enjoyed grass time this morning with two cats.  I went through a stack of old photos (we used to get double prints back in the age of film, and that makes for a lot of pictures that really don’t need to be saved), and I worked on my whimsical cardinal drawing.

Turns out that’s where my thoughts needed looking at! Here’s a selection:

“This isn’t going to turn out very well.” “You don’t know what you’re doing.” “Oh NO!  You’re going to wreck it!”  “Real artists would have a plan for this instead of just winging it.”  “Are you going to POST that for people to see?  What will they THINK???” “Why didn’t you just leave it?”  “OMG.”

Oh yes – another hallmark of people who struggle with weight loss, or getting things done, or managing their time, or letting themselves try creative writing or painting, is being critical.  Especially self-critical.  It can really stop you in your tracks.

So I just listened politely to my Chicken Little brain and said, “Thanks so much for your input.  We have to let ourselves mess up.  We have to try things.  It’s ok to play.  I don’t have plans for a gallery show at the Louvre.  There’s no such thing as messing this up – we really don’t need to be attached to those cardinals!  We can draw more if we feel like it!  Relax and enjoy!  This is fun!  I’m curious to see how it will all turn out! This isn’t a final piece – it is just for us – it’s in a sketchbook for goodness sake!  We are playing!  La la la!  Breathe!”

Yes – there’s all kinds of black and white thinking to watch for.  If your brain says anything with the word always or never – or even with a version of the verb “to be” – as in “I’m disorganized”, “I’m not a good artist”, “I’m too heavy”  — it sounds permanent and it’s a sign of black and white thinking or assuming that things that are one way will always be that way- assuming fixed conditions.  What if we replaced those thoughts with, “My desk contains some extra papers.” “I learn a lot when I play with art supplies.” or “Right now my body has some extra weight.” These don’t sound as permanent or like they’re part of our being – they’re just circumstances and they are subject to change. They’re not fixed conditions. They offer us many shades of grey to play with.

Here’s what’s happening with my whimsical cardinals (I spent a lot of the 30 minutes today staring and thinking, and stalling – see above)
And here’s a view of the sky from my grass time spot:

What kinds of black and white thinking or fixed condition thinking do you find yourself needing to watch for?

P.S.  During the past 6 days of this challenge, I also read all three 50 Shades of Grey books.  I will admit that I was entertained.  And I had no idea the story was ultimately so sweet.  I was prepared for something more 9 1/2 weeks and it was more like Harlequin Romance with a little steamy and kinky thrown in.  And this blog post title is totally a gratuitous reference to the Shades of Grey phenomenon – no doubt! 😉

30 Day Challenge Day 7: Have to or choose to?

15 Sunday Jul 2012

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Which feels better:  “I have to do it” or “I choose to do it?”  Because I don’t have to do this 30 day challenge.  I don’t have to do most things in life.  I don’t have to eat healthy or pay my bills or be nice to people or clean the house or practice meditation.

Most of the time, I choose to do these things, or at least some of them. I’m choosing to do this 30 day challenge because I want to prioritize creativity in my day.  I’m choosing to keep at it because I want to see what happens.

If I think to myself, “Ugh.  I have to go draw right now because I said I would” it feels like a chore.  Like an imposition from some external place.  Like following a diet or an organization plan.  Like it’s not my choice.

But if I think to myself, “Yay!  I’m taking care of myself by prioritizing my creativity and playing with colors and paper and seeing what happens!  I can’t wait!” – now that feels much better.

I can believe either thought.  They both go with the circumstance of taking on a 30 day challenge.  I’m picking the second one.  And check out what I can do when I give myself 30 minutes of play with paper!

I was inspired by this artist’s work that I cut out and put in a notebook years ago.  I think I’m going to do something similar with my picture of two cardinals that I copied out of Peterson’s bird book.  Lately I’m into copying (not tracing – just copying to get the main gist) from something already two-dimensional.  That’s what feels fun.

Now I’m excited about playing with this drawing some more tomorrow and making it all whimsical and dreamlike!

And here’s a view from my grass time spot.  These little Mexican petunias look a little like crinkly tissue paper after all the rain.

30 Day Challenge: Day 6 – Disaster?

14 Saturday Jul 2012

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I don’t know about you, but I’m so good about creating a bunch of rules, following them for a few days, breaking them and then feeling crappy.  I think this is how most diets go, no?  Or any kind of resolution?

I am so very determined to approach this whole thing differently this time.

I have to admit my ulterior motives.  I’m letting myself draw daily because I secretly want to have it make me more productive in other ways.  I guess this would be the same as someone saying daily affirmations, but what they really want is for that to help them lose weight.

So today, I drew.  I had my grass time.  I even cleaned under the sink, dusted and attended to my paper piles (which are pretty much non-existent because I deal with them every day- yay!)  And I made a cake.  Vegan.  From scratch.  (I am not a vegan, not even a vegetarian, but I was curious so gave it a shot.  Not bad!)  So my inner critic should be happily checking off the list, giving me gold stars, waving her pompoms around – something!

Instead, I’m thinking about how an unscheduled day where I had grand plans to work on some bigger projects (those ones I keep avoiding) slipped away.  I did take some turtle steps and I may do a little more later, but still – I can feel my body reacting with tension from my mind’s thoughts about how I didn’t do enough.

And that’s what’s made this type of challenge unsustainable for me in the past.  Doesn’t matter what I do, my mind gets disappointed, pointing out all the other stuff that didn’t get done.

So I’m just listening to my body.  Feeling it protest  –  agreeing with it. “Yes, this tight jaw is going to make this thing unsustainable… I understand…let’s go lay down and just breathe and relax for five minutes. I know – just ignore the mind – five minutes isn’t going to make or break anything.  Body, you get to call the shots. I’m listening more this time.”

It would so help if today’s drawing remotely resembled the original photo.

Photo:

Drawing:

Don’t judge – believe me – I have already noted every single thing that isn’t working!  I’m not trying to make a living as an artist – I’m just trying to let myself play, and drawing and coloring and playing around with trying to match the colors was fun, even if the outcome wasn’t so fabulous.

Here’s the very best part that I’ve saved for last.  These little guys keep showing up to remind me to SLOW DOWN!!  Take a breath for goodness sake!  I saw a dozen of them in about a two foot area during post-rain grass time today!

So no, today was not a disaster.  I have homemade vegan cake for goodness sake!  And tofu cream to put on top (frosting alternative- jury’s still out).  And I am breathing.  And I am grateful and lucky!