I've been pretty honest about how crazy my last relationship was. Stuck with that dude for nearly 4 effing years. Whatever, I'm kind of a determined fucking person who DOES NOT GIVE UP ON PEOPLE! Not until they have really dragged me through the dirt and I suddenly have to protect myself (Ok, I guess I'm never going to get a normal family going with this one...). Seriously, you have to really be a total dick for me to finally give up and leave your ass. I keep thinking you will change and suddenly start treating me right.
Luckily my husband has treated me right from the start... shocking! To me it was.
Anyway... many years ago I lived with this dude. We shared an apartment for THREE effing years. Again, I'm a determined little bugger who does not let go of things.
We shared a computer... my computer. He was, for whatever reason, really into buying music from iTunes. Something I have never done. I use iTunes to play music, but BUY music through iTunes.. no. Ew.
So I have all these... for lack of a better word, "links" to his music on my computer. I can't listen to them anymore, because they somehow followed me to a new computer I bought with my husband a few years ago. So they needed to be reauthorized by iTunes with a password. A password I don't have and would be wrong of me to use anyway.
We have since then bought a whole OTHER new computer, and they have followed me to that one too. These links to HIS music.
I don't even hate his music. I even like some of his music. But I can't play it, it just follows me as this reminder of the guy I used to live with (ha ha, no you can't play that song, because you dumped that guy, remember??). And finally, it is bugging the shit out of me. I NEED to get rid of these links to HIM. I have moved on with my life goddamnit. I turned the last of his T-shirts he never picked up into a rug.
But there doesn't seem to be an easy way to do this. And I swear I tried this once before a few years ago.
People who grew up before iTunes don't have this problem. Does anyone else have this problem? I fear I am the only one with this very weird problem.
Currently sorting through my song list by artist looking for his music to delete it.
Tuesday, February 26, 2013
Saturday, February 16, 2013
Things I Wish I knew at 20.
I'm turning thirty in a little over 2 weeks! I'm actually very excited. Good riddence to those 20s. The 20s suck I think because you think you know everything by age 20, but as the 20s go on you realise that you don't know shit. So if you are 20 or 21 or so I'm going to give you a few peices of knowledge I wish I had known.
1. Your Happiness is Dependant on You, nothing else.
I was one of those people that thought things like, "once I'm thin, I'll be happy, once I have a boyfriend/husband I'll be happy, once I have a job I'll be happy, once I have a baby, I'll finally be happy." Well, I got thin, I got a husband (and a pretty good one too), I got a job that paid enough, I even got a baby eventually, and you know what, NONE of these things actually influenced my overall happiness that much. It sure helped that I had a supportive husband to come home too, but it didn't actually fundamentally change me.
I'm someone who has to work really hard to be happy. It does not come naturally to me. It is something I have to think about... a lot. It is something I have to prioritize. It is something I had to research and invest time into. And it has very little to do with the actual events in my life. The moment my son was born, I was extremely happy... and then I proceeded to have the most unhappy four months of my life immediately after.
If you are looking for some life event to "solve" your issues, it isn't going to happen. Which brings me to point number 2.
2. The hardest things in life will usually bring the greatest growth and reward.
Let me say that this works to a point. I do not beleive the phrase, "what doesn't kill me will only make me stronger," That's like saying that if soemthing leave you weaker, you might as well have died. That's horrible. I have been through things in my life that did not make me stronger, they left deep wounds that I slowly am healing from. I may have learned some things from them, mostly learned what to avoid and what not to do, but I don't beleive they made me much of a better person.
What I'm talking about is that it would be wise to put yourself in situations that push you to the limits sometimes. The next time you think, "that sounds too hard," maybe you should try it. If you get through it, or reach your goal, or even try something new, you will grow as a person. If you sit around doing only what you know you are good at and what is easy, you will not grow, you will not experience a very fulfilling life.
Some of the hardest stuff I have done has been my work in my own therapy. But I came out through the other end a much better person, a much happier person, a much calmer person.
There are no quick fixes in life. At least none that don't have some pretty bad consequences.
I'd say the hardest things I've done in my life in particular order are:
1. EMDR Therapy
2. Carrying to term and naturally birthing my son.
3. Travelling solo in Thailand and France
4. Completing my college degree.
5. Losing nearly 50 pounds of weight healthily.
6. Leaving a really messed up realtionship and finding new love.
7. Sucessfully breastfeeding my child for 20 months and counting.
8. Partening my child the way I know is best.
9. Planning my entire wedding and actually going through with the marriage.
10. Overcoming the need (99% of the time) for psychoactive meds.
The above list was very hard, but brought me incredible rewards and feelings of empowerment and strength. A lot of it took large leaps of faith. I had to have faith that things would be OK. There are no guarantees in life. These are just a list of things that were mostly sucessful too. I have failed at many things too. Or not quite gotten what I want out of something, but in no way was the journey not worth it. Which brings me to a note about journeys..
3. Positivity will benefit you greatly.
I used to be very anxious, and when I am stressed or tired, or recovering from my overnight job, my anxiety flares up like crazy and I worry about lots of things. I'm a very future focused person, always thinking of things I could do in the future. I've come to learn that enjoying the journey and seeing what you have now is really wonderful. I'm now very negative about negativity.
Don't get me wrong, I still want to hear about your problems. But there is a difference between talking about the troubles in your life and simply complaining about every red light you come to. Tell me about how hard parenting is, even specifically, stop telling me how annoying your kids are. They are kids, yours are no more crazy than the next pair, kids are insane because they have insane underdeveloped kid brains. This is why we drink coffee and wine and support each other by saying things like, "your kid is normal, and yes it sucks sometimes." Did you really think this was going to be easy??
You will feel much better if you try to change your attitude a bit. I used to think attitude was bullshit and just felt like a victim. All these people were doing things to me! Well, now I don't feel like a victim, even when my car was broken into and my GPS unit stolen, I felt a little shocked and insecure, but I knew the window could get fixed, the GPS was cheap and probably whoever stole it needed it more than me. It doesn't make it right, but I was able to stay calm and didn't let it bother me. In fact it was kind of fun recruiting my coworkers to attempt to tape a plastic bag over my window during a blizzard. It was hard, but we did it! Overall not such a bad experience!
Anytime there is struggle there is something to be learned from it, something to build your character. If you look for these things, things will go way smoother.
I have spent many late nights calming my crying child thinking about how I am helping his neural pathways find joy more easily by simply holding him and rocking him. I've thought about how I am planting the seeds for an easier, happier kid in the future. How I will learn to fuction on less sleep and get creative with naps and sleep schedules.
Now when I am up at 2 am unable to sleep and my kid is sleeping I try to enjoy the alone time, instead of worry about the sleep I'm not getting. We don't have much control over what happened in the past or what will happen in the future, but we do have control over how we perceive the present. Enjoy the ride of life, for godssake!
4. People are just as, if not more, messed up as you.
I used to think I was basically insane. Then I met other "insane" people and I thought they were alright, then I calmed down a bit and kept running into more and more people that just seemed to not have their shit together. Everywhere, thousands of people without their shit together, all of them with some major problem in their life, many of them taking antidepressants, or smoking cigarettes, or sleeping around, or remaining in dysfunctional relationships. After a while I began to think, "where are the sane people?" And the people I thought of as sane I also thought were pretty boring. They certainly didn't have the most interesting stories to tell.
Turns out most of us are a bit messed up. I have eyed a few pretty together people, my husband for instance (though he might disagree). I have a couple close friends I think are pretty level headed and together. The one thing they have in common is that they decided long ago that they didn't want to be like other people they saw. They wanted to be "sane." I have often asked my husband, "why is it that you never yell or really get that upset? You rarely complain and never say anything mean?" He says simply, "that's not who I want to be." He made a concious effort sometime before we started dating to NOT be like that, to be calm and collected. These people are huge inspirations.
I also get a long well with those that totaly own up to their craziness. I can pretty much deal with any crazy as long as the person is aware of it and is all like, "oh crap there I go with my crazy again, oops."
What I can't deal with is the insane that think they have their shit together. Especially those that seem to think they can do no wrong and constantly defend themselves by basically saying, "well this is who I am, take it or leave it." Ironically these are usually the people that would be able to handle your abandoment the least. These people rarely apologise.
I remember early in my career getting hit by one of the clients I was working with. A few minutes later he said, "I'm sorry, Andrea." I almost started crying. I wanted to say, "a lot of people have hurt me in my life, but done have apologized as quickly as you did." I of course accepted his apology and had to accept him as well. Which brings me to my next point...
5. Acceptance is a huge relief.
I think if we all just accepted our lives the way they are now and accepted our family for who they are now and accepted the world, we would all be a lot happier. I used to think acceptance was just rolling over and taking whatever shit was thrown your way, but now I realise I can still fight for my rights and also accept that I may not have all the rights I want right now.
I have often found myself saying to my husband when we talk about our life that these early parenting years are simply going to be years of not having much money and not having much time. They are temporary. EVERYTHING is temporary. It has helped me greatly to think about myself in politics as a small peice of a large puzzle that won't be finished for thousands of years. I'm a socialist, so the bottom line is that I want to get rid of the capitalist system. That' really the ONE thing I am fightly for. But OMG, that is one HUGE thing. One thing I cannot do on my own, in fact one thing I probably have very little influence on at all. That doesn't mean I don't participate. I think too many people don't participate in things like politics because they want quick results, and this stuff is not quick. At least not the good stuff like getting everyone affordable health care.
Sorry to say it to the folks that love them some capitalism... capitalism is a temporary state that will end someday, in fact it's only really been around a few hundred years. I don't know what will come next, but I know something will, it might be better or it might be worse. I hope better, but I might not get to see any real change in my lifetime. I can accept that, but still participate. I have been part of strong movements that have completely failed. It doesn't mean the flight was not a good one. There are no garantees for the good guys to win, in fact the odds are often heavily stacked in favor of the bad guys. And the history books are often written by the winners.
Anyway, you don't have to be a socialist to accept things. This is just my huge acceptance example.
I have found that I am thinking less and less about things being pleasent or unpleasent, and more that aweing at their existance. I think I'm a pretty unique indivdual and I used to really look at my good and bad qualities and now I try to just be in awe of all my qualities and accept them as they are. If I accept them, then they ones I want to change are easier to over come. Even capitalism, which I hate, is a sight to behold. Have my husband try to explain how he invests in the stock market to see the craziness of it. That stock market crap is INSANE and almost ungraspable to me cognitively. Isn't this why people stare at train wrecks?
1. Your Happiness is Dependant on You, nothing else.
I was one of those people that thought things like, "once I'm thin, I'll be happy, once I have a boyfriend/husband I'll be happy, once I have a job I'll be happy, once I have a baby, I'll finally be happy." Well, I got thin, I got a husband (and a pretty good one too), I got a job that paid enough, I even got a baby eventually, and you know what, NONE of these things actually influenced my overall happiness that much. It sure helped that I had a supportive husband to come home too, but it didn't actually fundamentally change me.
I'm someone who has to work really hard to be happy. It does not come naturally to me. It is something I have to think about... a lot. It is something I have to prioritize. It is something I had to research and invest time into. And it has very little to do with the actual events in my life. The moment my son was born, I was extremely happy... and then I proceeded to have the most unhappy four months of my life immediately after.
If you are looking for some life event to "solve" your issues, it isn't going to happen. Which brings me to point number 2.
2. The hardest things in life will usually bring the greatest growth and reward.
Let me say that this works to a point. I do not beleive the phrase, "what doesn't kill me will only make me stronger," That's like saying that if soemthing leave you weaker, you might as well have died. That's horrible. I have been through things in my life that did not make me stronger, they left deep wounds that I slowly am healing from. I may have learned some things from them, mostly learned what to avoid and what not to do, but I don't beleive they made me much of a better person.
What I'm talking about is that it would be wise to put yourself in situations that push you to the limits sometimes. The next time you think, "that sounds too hard," maybe you should try it. If you get through it, or reach your goal, or even try something new, you will grow as a person. If you sit around doing only what you know you are good at and what is easy, you will not grow, you will not experience a very fulfilling life.
Some of the hardest stuff I have done has been my work in my own therapy. But I came out through the other end a much better person, a much happier person, a much calmer person.
There are no quick fixes in life. At least none that don't have some pretty bad consequences.
I'd say the hardest things I've done in my life in particular order are:
1. EMDR Therapy
2. Carrying to term and naturally birthing my son.
3. Travelling solo in Thailand and France
4. Completing my college degree.
5. Losing nearly 50 pounds of weight healthily.
6. Leaving a really messed up realtionship and finding new love.
7. Sucessfully breastfeeding my child for 20 months and counting.
8. Partening my child the way I know is best.
9. Planning my entire wedding and actually going through with the marriage.
10. Overcoming the need (99% of the time) for psychoactive meds.
The above list was very hard, but brought me incredible rewards and feelings of empowerment and strength. A lot of it took large leaps of faith. I had to have faith that things would be OK. There are no guarantees in life. These are just a list of things that were mostly sucessful too. I have failed at many things too. Or not quite gotten what I want out of something, but in no way was the journey not worth it. Which brings me to a note about journeys..
3. Positivity will benefit you greatly.
I used to be very anxious, and when I am stressed or tired, or recovering from my overnight job, my anxiety flares up like crazy and I worry about lots of things. I'm a very future focused person, always thinking of things I could do in the future. I've come to learn that enjoying the journey and seeing what you have now is really wonderful. I'm now very negative about negativity.
Don't get me wrong, I still want to hear about your problems. But there is a difference between talking about the troubles in your life and simply complaining about every red light you come to. Tell me about how hard parenting is, even specifically, stop telling me how annoying your kids are. They are kids, yours are no more crazy than the next pair, kids are insane because they have insane underdeveloped kid brains. This is why we drink coffee and wine and support each other by saying things like, "your kid is normal, and yes it sucks sometimes." Did you really think this was going to be easy??
You will feel much better if you try to change your attitude a bit. I used to think attitude was bullshit and just felt like a victim. All these people were doing things to me! Well, now I don't feel like a victim, even when my car was broken into and my GPS unit stolen, I felt a little shocked and insecure, but I knew the window could get fixed, the GPS was cheap and probably whoever stole it needed it more than me. It doesn't make it right, but I was able to stay calm and didn't let it bother me. In fact it was kind of fun recruiting my coworkers to attempt to tape a plastic bag over my window during a blizzard. It was hard, but we did it! Overall not such a bad experience!
Anytime there is struggle there is something to be learned from it, something to build your character. If you look for these things, things will go way smoother.
I have spent many late nights calming my crying child thinking about how I am helping his neural pathways find joy more easily by simply holding him and rocking him. I've thought about how I am planting the seeds for an easier, happier kid in the future. How I will learn to fuction on less sleep and get creative with naps and sleep schedules.
Now when I am up at 2 am unable to sleep and my kid is sleeping I try to enjoy the alone time, instead of worry about the sleep I'm not getting. We don't have much control over what happened in the past or what will happen in the future, but we do have control over how we perceive the present. Enjoy the ride of life, for godssake!
4. People are just as, if not more, messed up as you.
I used to think I was basically insane. Then I met other "insane" people and I thought they were alright, then I calmed down a bit and kept running into more and more people that just seemed to not have their shit together. Everywhere, thousands of people without their shit together, all of them with some major problem in their life, many of them taking antidepressants, or smoking cigarettes, or sleeping around, or remaining in dysfunctional relationships. After a while I began to think, "where are the sane people?" And the people I thought of as sane I also thought were pretty boring. They certainly didn't have the most interesting stories to tell.
Turns out most of us are a bit messed up. I have eyed a few pretty together people, my husband for instance (though he might disagree). I have a couple close friends I think are pretty level headed and together. The one thing they have in common is that they decided long ago that they didn't want to be like other people they saw. They wanted to be "sane." I have often asked my husband, "why is it that you never yell or really get that upset? You rarely complain and never say anything mean?" He says simply, "that's not who I want to be." He made a concious effort sometime before we started dating to NOT be like that, to be calm and collected. These people are huge inspirations.
I also get a long well with those that totaly own up to their craziness. I can pretty much deal with any crazy as long as the person is aware of it and is all like, "oh crap there I go with my crazy again, oops."
What I can't deal with is the insane that think they have their shit together. Especially those that seem to think they can do no wrong and constantly defend themselves by basically saying, "well this is who I am, take it or leave it." Ironically these are usually the people that would be able to handle your abandoment the least. These people rarely apologise.
I remember early in my career getting hit by one of the clients I was working with. A few minutes later he said, "I'm sorry, Andrea." I almost started crying. I wanted to say, "a lot of people have hurt me in my life, but done have apologized as quickly as you did." I of course accepted his apology and had to accept him as well. Which brings me to my next point...
5. Acceptance is a huge relief.
I think if we all just accepted our lives the way they are now and accepted our family for who they are now and accepted the world, we would all be a lot happier. I used to think acceptance was just rolling over and taking whatever shit was thrown your way, but now I realise I can still fight for my rights and also accept that I may not have all the rights I want right now.
I have often found myself saying to my husband when we talk about our life that these early parenting years are simply going to be years of not having much money and not having much time. They are temporary. EVERYTHING is temporary. It has helped me greatly to think about myself in politics as a small peice of a large puzzle that won't be finished for thousands of years. I'm a socialist, so the bottom line is that I want to get rid of the capitalist system. That' really the ONE thing I am fightly for. But OMG, that is one HUGE thing. One thing I cannot do on my own, in fact one thing I probably have very little influence on at all. That doesn't mean I don't participate. I think too many people don't participate in things like politics because they want quick results, and this stuff is not quick. At least not the good stuff like getting everyone affordable health care.
Sorry to say it to the folks that love them some capitalism... capitalism is a temporary state that will end someday, in fact it's only really been around a few hundred years. I don't know what will come next, but I know something will, it might be better or it might be worse. I hope better, but I might not get to see any real change in my lifetime. I can accept that, but still participate. I have been part of strong movements that have completely failed. It doesn't mean the flight was not a good one. There are no garantees for the good guys to win, in fact the odds are often heavily stacked in favor of the bad guys. And the history books are often written by the winners.
Anyway, you don't have to be a socialist to accept things. This is just my huge acceptance example.
I have found that I am thinking less and less about things being pleasent or unpleasent, and more that aweing at their existance. I think I'm a pretty unique indivdual and I used to really look at my good and bad qualities and now I try to just be in awe of all my qualities and accept them as they are. If I accept them, then they ones I want to change are easier to over come. Even capitalism, which I hate, is a sight to behold. Have my husband try to explain how he invests in the stock market to see the craziness of it. That stock market crap is INSANE and almost ungraspable to me cognitively. Isn't this why people stare at train wrecks?
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