Pinned

In this picture, the holes in my earlobes are from misguided youthful choices. But if you look in the very top of my ear, there's a square of beige tape. That's an acupuncture tack.

So, I've been going to acupuncture.

A new place, Mend, opened near my office in Hampden, and after hearing good things, I decided to try it out.

There are a few things about acupuncture to know before going:

1. Know WHY you want to go. Acupuncture is for a specific malady or issue. I'm told you can go for preventative purposes, but I think it still has to be for something in particular. I, myself, decided to try it because I am...how shall I put this....MILDLY EXTREMELY HIGH STRUNG. I decided to try acupuncture as a way of addressing my insomnia and MILDLY EXTREME HIGH STRINGINESS. 

2. The needles do not, usually, hurt. Sometimes it's like a mosquito sting, but only in certain places. While you're lying there, the area around the needles will sometimes itch a bit and some of mine do turn red for an hour or so after. But, other than that, there's no discomfort.

3. You don't have to DO anything.

The reason I state #3 is because, on my first visit, after a consultation, the acupuncturist put the various needles in me, and then told me to just lay back and relax. I asked her what I was supposed to do, and she said - Nothing. Just lie there, daydream, sleep, or bring some headphones or a book. Stay for at least 30 minutes. "The needles are doing all the work," she said.

I've now been 5 times, and I'm a total pro. I go, I get my needles for the day, and I zonk out on a ridiculously comfortable leather chair. For someone who can only nap for 10-20 minutes at a time, I completely pass out during acupuncture. Today, I napped for a record 40 minutes. Out cold. 

The acupuncture I go to is community acupuncture, meaning there are 7 chairs in the room and various other people napping and relaxing during their treatments. But it's very quiet, with soft music playing, and it smells really nice. The room is always just a little bit cool, perfect for napping, and there are deliciously soft blankets hanging on a rack if you need one. There's something strangely peaceful about napping in a room with strangers while full of pins. It's so relaxing. I can't explain why.

The ear tacks are a new part of treatment - she put them in this afternoon, and you can wear them for up to two days. There's a tiny little acupuncture needle on the other side of the tape, and it just stays in your ears for prolonged treatment. 

Does it work? I think so. In the five weeks since I started, I'm sleeping better, my late-afternoon tension headaches have faded, and I definitely feel several degrees less MILDLY EXTREMELY HIGH STRUNG.

I have a few sessions left, and then will re-evaluate how the whole process worked. But, so far, at the very least, it's not doing any harm and I get to go and take an expensive nap in a nice smelling room full of peaceful strangers. 

Take Initiative

#6 on the Happiness Project: Take Initiative at work.

How does this translate?

MERCURY RETROGRADE has me in a state of unease. I am disorganized, feeling sleepy and slightly panicked, and seriously self-doubting. Why do these things always go altogether like some jambling, horrible, off-key sonata? I constantly feel as though I am a step behind, or too far ahead, or somehow lacking crucial details. This is typical Mercury Retrograde, but also typical of what happens whenever I neglect to allot enough time for what I've come to term "White Space."

White Space is clean, clear, and under control. White Space is "I don't have to be anywhere at this moment but where I am." White Space is "STFU, turn the phone off, and no, I am not answering that email RIGHTTHISSECOND." White Space is an active passiveness, a stepping away.

I find excellent White Space in monotonous activities. Cooking, showering, on the treadmill at the gym. When my body is occupied and my mind is mine, all mine. But you can find White Space in a variety of environments and tasks.

Not driving. White Space requires a sense of relaxation, of not-constant vigilence. Maybe a long drive. Sunset in autumn, wide road, destination far off, no traffic, music blaring. That could be White Space.

White Space is undemanding, and requires nothing of you but the untangling of thought processes and the general resetting of one's state of being. Interruptions, false starts, or impatient stimuli disturb this.

So...how does this translate to taking initiative at work and happiness? Well, I define "work" as not simply what you do during business hours or how you make money, but any sort of project that you engage in that requires brain or brawn power. It could be errands, chores, To Do's, any of those things. Taking initiative and actively grabbing responsibility causes wheels to turn and things to get done.

All in the hope of creating more White Space for oneself.

White Space requires a silencing of all other demands, and most of the time the only way these demands in our lives can be silenced is if they are addressed. To pursue White Space means to clear up the clutter of your life, to tie up the loose ends and dot "i's" and cross "t's" and confirm, confirm, confirm. That way, nothing can creep in to White Space. Taking initiative to clear your own plate of responsibility not only makes you feel able and proactive, it also gives you a sense of completion and productivity that will come in handy when you're ready to wipe the slate clean and decompress.

It's sort of like lying on the couch. Lying on the couch, reading chick lit. How relaxing! But wait....did you remember to take out the trash? If it doesn't go out right now, you'll forget. And if you forget, the bins will be overflowing next week and you'll receive one of those ridiculously passive aggressive "friendly reminders" from your Neighborhood Association representative who--of course--has been keeping tabs on the state of your garbage disposal. And taking out the trash requires- crap- that you purchase new trash bags. Which means you have to put gas in your car.

Lying on the couch reading a chick lit book has suddenly become a Thursday evening nightmare of chores and To Do lists.

Taking initiative means keeping all of the little tick tocks of your life up-to-date, in working order, and at least halfway full with a note (physically written and placed strategically) to buy more. To avoid interruption of White Space. To cultivate a sense of completion and relaxation. Which leads to.....happiness. Oh the joy of chores done, clean house, phone calls made, wine glass full, new book to be read, and no where to be or anyone to answer to. Bliss!

I liken it to vacation. When I go on vacation, I want the house spotless, laundry done, bills paid, chores completed so that when I come back, I am walking into a clear space. Whilst on vacation, I'm not lying there obsessing over whether or not I remembered to buy cat litter. It's been done. I took care of it. Breathe sigh of relief. Nothing infiltrates White Space.

Take initiative. On the job, start to notice little loose ends that require tightening. Confirm, confirm, confirm.

(I cannot stress this point enough: CONFIRM!)

I wish you healthy productivity and rejuvenating White Space. Get cracking.

Savor Everyday Moments

O then each breath tasted sweeter, and all that day my food nourish'd me more, and the beautiful day pass'd well
-Walt Whitman

Savoring Everyday Moments has become a sort of Zen practice for me. A way of checking in with my surroundings, of feeling the connection of my feet to the earth and the greater networks that span through and around me securing me to these thin threads that hold everything together.

I don't think I ever knew how to slow my mind down, how to adopt patience and peace, until recently. Because my days now have a flow and rhythm that sits well with me, I find myself so much more at ease. My fists have unfurled, my smiles come easier, and a lot of this has to do with perspective.

Finding the balance between keeping oneself focused on the present moment and maintaining a sense of healthy perspective is a practice that required diligence and positivity. Food, nature, companionship, art, and beauty are all things that root me to the present moment. Patience, hope, and grace give me greater perspective when it comes to things like troublesome world issues, momentary crises, or all of the little and great things that make life difficult. Just as you know a moment of beauty will pass, so too can you accept that a moment of hardship will fade just as easily.

I've been documenting things that make me happy, things that let me savor the present. Moments of my day that root me in the here and now. A lot of it, I've noticed, has to do with food. This is ok. I love food.

To get us started on this week of savoring the present:

Not Zen.

Snap and I used to keep a running list of all things "Not Fashion." Like- all-white sneakers. Acid-wash jeans (although Urban Outfitters seems intent on bringing those back.) Scrunchies. "Not Fashion."

Recently, having made leaps and bounds in my personal goals, I have been desperately trying to cultivate the sense of inner peace that's grown in all of these accomplishments. Part of my outlook for 2010 was to treat everyone as worthy, to be as sincere as possible, and to step outside of my own little box of self-contained trouble and attempt to not sweat the small stuff. Focusing on kindness towards others is an excellent way to not freak out internally about stupid crap.

But then Life creeps up on me, and I backslide, and I have these moments that I am now calling "Not Zen."

As in: the sheer opposite of Zen.

As in: everything else shrinks and my personal problem becomes larger than the universe and has to be dealt with RIGHT NOW.

This happens in a number of places: traffic, the grocery store, waiting tables. My patience gets stretched to thin threads threatening to snap.

A few weeks ago, I made a mistake at work. I forgot to ring in an order. It happens. I apologized, I did everything I could to make the situation right, and the ornery guest whose order had been forgotten (rather than accepting my blunder and genuine apology) rolled her eyes at me and slammed her silverware around on the table. Her decidedly "Not Zen" reaction created in me an equally "Not Zen" disdain and a frighteningly strong "Not Even Close To Being Peaceful" urge to inflict bodily harm. I had visions of flipping the table, plates and glasses going everywhere, while I instructed the guest precisely what physical action she could take with herself.

I did not do this.

Instead, I gave myself a time out. I walked away and went upstairs and cleaned glasses or something until I could breathe normally again.

I am reminded I am human when things like this happen. That I am not nearly the calm, peaceful person I aspire to be at times. Yes, I have gotten better. What makes me flip my shit at 28 is certainly light years beyond what could set me off at 19, 22, 25. But it still happens. And it becomes frightening to me how quickly I can enrage over the slightest thing.

Today it was the air conditioner.

I am frantically attempting to balance multiple things in my life right now: starting a new job next week, tying up loose ends, packing for this weekend's trip to the beach (which was supposed to be a relaxing, fun weekend away but is starting to feel frantic, hectic, and stressful.)

I was in the midst of said packing, after a day of running errands and getting ready to leave tomorrow, when Whack came upstairs to inform me that the air conditioner was leaking.

You would have thought she told me that someone had murdered my cats.

I just completely lost it. Thinking about calling an AC repair person (because between Whack and I we have this extensive knowledge of AC units: they turn on and off) on a holiday weekend, waiting for him/her (you never know) to come out, living in a row house in July with no AC, worrying about the pets, possibly having to postpone my beach trip to wait for said repair person, worrying about fronting the cost, worrying that wires would short and the house would explode, and then not being able to call a "Time Out" for myself because I was in a hurry and this needed to be addressed Immediately.

I did the two things I always do when something breaks down, blows up, or (in this case) begins emitting mysterious water: called male friends who know things about machines, and Googled.

Meanwhile, I bitched to Whack about the situation. OF COURSE this happens at 5pm on a Friday on a holiday weekend. OF COURSE this needs to be addressed, and OF COURSE it happens when I'm trying to get my act together to get out of town.

Because, you know, I am the victim here. The underlying thought was: OF COURSE this is happening...to me. Like my air conditioning unit and the universe conspired to push me over the edge. Because, you know, everything revolves around me.

This is what happens in these "Not Zen" moments. I become so utterly self-absorbed that I am actually convinced that this is not something stupid or awful that is happening because of a series of random coincidences, it is happening TO ME. Losing your Zen is losing your perspective.

After a lot of freaking out, a lot of confused advice from patient male friends trying to get a grasp on the situation while I am commencing said freak-out, and a lot of Googling it appeared that there is a magic equation for sweating AC ducts in your laundry room.

When you do four loads of laundry, as Whack and I did today, it causes humidity. When you close the door to the laundry room, the chilly cool air ducts coming out of the air conditioner sweat in the humidity like a whore in church.

Solution: turn off the dryer and the AC. Open the windows. Let things dry off.

Such a simple answer to what, moments ago, spelled disaster in my mind.

These things trip me up. I get frazzled and stressed and caught up in MY world that when the real world interrupts, it's viewed as this incredibly violating thing. "Not Zen" moments are still things I just have no idea how to circumvent or deal with, and although my tendency to fly off the handle has gotten somewhat under control the past few years, it still happens.

At least I didn't throw anything this time, like the epic "Not Zen" episode of 2005 when I spilled a bottle of champagne on my laptop while I was finishing a final paper for the first year of my Masters. My ex tells me he still cites this "Not Zen" moment in his stand-up comedy shows. Rightfully so. It was beyond "Not Zen." It bordered on "Psychotic Freak-Out."

Those are fewer and further between, thankfully.

But still. "Not Zen." Not good.