Have you ever been in a good mood – not just a good mood, a GREAT mood – one that ends up with you driving down the highway while belting out Ven Comigo by Daddy Yankee and Prince Royce, despite the fact that you very much do not speak Spanish https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u36BRQpnf0o ? Welcome to my year. I don’t know how or why or what sexual favours I had to do in my past life, but in the past 12 months, it’s as if everything has fallen into place. Both inside and out. Is this what happens when you finally get truly comfortable with yourself? The universe officially levels you up and you have finally unlocked the bonus level of joy? Now, you’re probably already sick of me and thinking “WTF, if all you’re going to do is brag, I’m not reading this shit.” And you would partially be right, however, this post is more about appreciating the little things than showing off all the cool things I’ve done. You’ll also notice that some of the “cool things” are pretty mundane, but they lead to a better understanding of myself, so that makes them just as important as, say, the trip to Vietnam. Just bear with me. Also, I’m selfishly typing this out as a reminder to myself, that on the days that my Anxiety takes over and I feel like I can’t function in society, it’s just a blip and a happiness pot of gold is waiting somewhere at the end of the panic attack rainbow.
The entire purpose of this blog was supposed to be a way to drag me out of my safety zone as I tried and experienced new things. I began this 2 years ago, forcing myself to instigate excitement in my own life. For 2017 it was great, and then 2018 was rough, as my one year challenge was over and I found myself lost as to how to still live life to the fullest while not trying to “force” it as I had the year before. I needed to figure out how to enjoy the little things, the moments in between the fun activities. Towards the end of 2018 I just gave up. A bunch of my plans had fallen through, things were not working out how I wanted them, and I was struggling to keep my anxiety about the future in check. That is also why there was a big gap in posts on here, as I struggled to find direction. You can even see it in the fist few posts in 2019, when I was mainly just typing up a travelogue as my way of trying to find my groove. I never even managed to finish my posts about my Vietnam vacation, because the travelogue posts just felt disingenuous.
But towards the end of the summer, something in my brain clicked. I actually had been living 2019 in “the Amazing Race way” that I had wanted beginning 2017. My lifestyle had organically changed so that those things just happened without the specific effort and intention that I had to invest before. I had evolved into a more reasonable Jim Carey in “Yes Man”, my fear in trying new things was almost gone, and my desire to experience everything was overpowering.
Here I was, settled into life in Montreal, a city that I freaking love and am proud to call home. For the first time in my mind I feel like a Montrealer, not just a transplanted Vancouverite. My job is going well, and I found myself with a larger but closer network of friends than I’ve ever had. At one point the Hubby and I looked at each other and were like “are we the cool kids now? Is this what being popular feels like?” Neither of us, a couple of nerdy homebody indoor kids, could compute this. Our social calendar this summer left us with a lot of weekends that were completely tied up, as well as regular evening plans on Mondays and Wednesdays, plus extra events…By September I was craving a quiet weekend where I had time to curl up on the couch and binge an entire season of something on Netflix. But I wouldn’t change any of it for the world, because everything we did was emotionally or physically fulfilling, and had played a part in making this my best year ever.
It had only taken me 35 years, but I could finally appreciate what I had, not what I didn’t. Is this a mid life crisis? If it is, it’s fucking awesome.
I was also strangely comfortable with myself. My happiness was no longer tied to the people and things around me, and there are days when I genuinely crave hopping in the car and taking myself out. I had also learned to appreciate the meditative properties of long drives or walks with good music and an open road. Not having a schedule had always been terrifying to me, the security blanket of a regular routine helped me keep balanced. But the schedule this year has been so busy that it was not an option, and you know what, it didn’t matter. Now I know that if I deviate from my routine, I will not burst into flames or satellites will not fall from the sky.
Whereas before I had to work to make oppourtunities happen, they were suddenly presenting themselves to me. My escape room team has now gone to three countries and 5 cities. My trainer at the gym decided to use me as a guinea pig and try something totally new with my program, and it’s left we stronger than ever, despite not having the time to work out 6 days a week like before. My husband has gotten on board and we went on a spontaneous anniversary trip to New Orleans. I changed anxiety medication and this one freaking rocks. Work sent me to Turkey. A friend and I managed to get over our horror movie phobias together.
Don’t get me wrong, this is not without it’s new challenges. This “try everything” lifestyle can get expensive. I tend to abandon my husband over the weekend – he says he doesn’t mind, that he likes staying in his pajama pants playing video games in peace, and he usually refuses when I invite him to join – but it still feels weird. I have developed a massive caffeine habit that is probably doing damage to my internal organs. Cooking has become a distant memory, because making time for that just didn’t make the cut. Sleep is something I now have to make sure I prioritize because if I don’t, enough of it doesn’t always happen. When something goes wrong, I get super bitchy about it. And it makes me physically uncomfortable when the hubs and I discuss purchasing the dream house we have talked about for years, because everything is so good now that I’m worried that moving to a different part of the city will disrupt my perfect balance and throw off my groove. We’re still working through that.
So what this has all boiled down to is that I’m happy. While the results of my 2017 “MYTAR” Amazing Race experiment were not immediately noticeable, they have permeated me on a cellular level and led to me being able to appreciate myself and those people and things around me. This post may have been one bug brag, but fuck it, it was #worthit.
Another Pin On The Map 