the muse takes attendance
The thing you are dying to know: "What is happening with Beth? Is she any happier than she was last year, and can she tell me how she got there?"
The response is in two categories, internal and external.
My internal work is centered around pouting. Pouting is the state when life circumstances dish something out, and you do not have the skill to face that it's not what you want. You don't have the skill to make lemonade out of lemons, and instead you smash the lemons against the side of the nearest building and curse. Pouting is any demonstrable behavior which says "I am not up to this challenge, and I am not up to asking for help either. Certainly I can't ask for help from YOU. So here I sit doing something that I wouldn't ordinarily do if I was in a good mood." Getting rid of pouting might just be the holy grail for me.
My external work - that which can be viewed externally - is centered around evenings. Evenings are prime pouting times. How that demonstrates itself is, I have spent the whole day doing things for other people or otherwise ignoring myself. I ate from the vending machine. I peed only once it became dire, and only after spending some time wishing I could have my body removed and be a robot with a brain slushing around in a futuristic fish tank like Mr. Burns. Also, I may have spent the day ignoring my needs for relaxation, for connecting with others, and fueling the need to create an identity out of my working life. Then there's the commute on top of that. So coming home I want my slippers and the paper. Except, for me, it's cooking. I want my deglazing and my truffle oil. I come home, put the apron on, and not only am I in a state of flow, but I am moving my body and feeding people. It works for me. Only trouble is, it makes my identity revolve around food.
I have yet to find a solution to the pouting. At this point, all I can do is call myself on it. I reach for a substance, a credit card, or a project that does not meet my needs, or I lock the door and say don't mess with texas. Not today. I do have the capability to observe - I do not have more details on how to turn positive action into a celebration of being alive, specialness, health, etc. But observation, I think I can pull that off. Am I pouting at this particular moment, yes or no. I think I have been pouting practically forever, so this awareness is pretty important.
Externally, the solution of course is to get out of the kitchen. It also means I need to eat vegetables in the evening, which forces me to connect with my body during the day and get most of my caloric needs met at other meals, at a time during the day when it's not "payback time." That's the first component, not to cook. The second component is to do my art.
Oh, golly, what IS my art you might ask. I have no idea. Pretty sure there are the twin stars of music and writing, and a few shiny moons out there too, but understand I have been so nuts and bolts for so long. The only thing I am 100% sure of is that I am on this planet to be engaged creatively. Yet here I am, with complete negative flow in the creative department. I get out of the kitchen and I miss it. I do good work in there. What could be so wrong with cooking. Well, if it eclipses everything else then yes, there are a few things wrong with it.
Which brings me to attendance. If you are not in the state of flow with a project, if you don't even know how to play your instrument for example, or just have a few 3x5 cards with ideas on them and not anything that could be described as momentum, what I simply must believe at this point is that attendance matters. I resolve to show up, almost every night, at some sort of thing in my own living room etc, that falls under the category of music or writing and can be described as creative in some way. It's awful. I might as well have taken ballet. I sit down to do the things I am best at, and I go about klunking around and can hardly stand every second I am there. The only thing that consoles me is the thought that someone - some THING - might be taking attendance, and at one point it will need to count for less and less of the grade.
It's odd to want to do something that you are good at, and have to slay dragons to get there, and find yourself looking at this thing thinking wow, how many more minutes do you think, before I can go back to my old habits. What a challenge to want it so badly you are willing to put up with the humiliation of being stumped on the interview question you were hoping they'd ask you.
So, in conclusion, no question I am happier than I was last year. But it wasn't this work that did it. Not at all. Between last year and this, it was really moving some bigger checker pieces around and just making it through some life events. If this year is a baseline, it will be more of a challenge to improve on for next year. (Depending on how much attendance affects my grade.)