Surely I can't be the only one who drowns in self-doubt from time to time. Doubt crept into my mind and became part of my thought loop and vocabulary sometime around the age of 13. Even when I am busy it seems to find its way into my gray matter, but it seems to hit the worst when I am folding laundry or doing dishes and my brain surges onto that roller coaster of self-loathing.
I am currently trying to get through a book by the Dalai Lama called An Open Heart (it was written in 2001, but who cares -- his work is timeless). He indicates in the book that half the battle of meditation (something he does to redirect his negative thoughts into positive ones, put very simply) is to recognize when these negative thoughts come and then redirect them, or substitute positive thoughts in their place. That seemed like an easy concept at first, but then not so much so as time went on.
So here I am. I decided to create this additional blog, http://brendasalterego.blogspot.com/ (my other blog is http://humanityandinsanity.blogspot.com/ ) to cleanse my psyche a bit, to vent, to vomit up my negative thoughts onto our computer's flat screen, to gripe, to heave that weight of negativity off of my shoulders when it appears, and to get on with my life. I found it quite coincidental that just tonight I stumbled across a guitarist's blog ( http://www.guitarprinciples.com/blog/2010/11/09/the-self-created-guitar-student-failure-trap/ ) in which she addresses the self-fulfilling prophecy of failure that most of us have been plagued by at one point or another in our lives. I found her perspective very enlightening: stop overthinking and JUST DO IT. It seems like I have heard that phrase before somewhere.
I sorted an immense amount of laundry in our basement today while my younger sister, who is currently a junior in college, watched my two boys. While I was moving the clean towels and washcloths over to the dryer tonight, I noticed that one of Charlie's socks and one of our kitchen towels had mold on them. Is that a case of serious neglect? Surely I can't be the only one who has had mold on things in her laundry once in a blue moon. I can tell myself that things like that happen because I choose to spend time with my children, but let's be honest here...our house needs a lot of work done in it.
By the end of the day I should be hitting it hard, but I am usually exhausted by the time we get the boys to sleep and I end up going to bed instead. That does take a mental toll, though. It is tough to get up to a messy kitchen, unfolded laundry, and piles of "stuff" everywhere and then wade through dog hair and trip on clutter while trying to clear off an incessantly crammed and dirty set of kitchen counters. Surely I can't be the only one who prays for a clean pair before opening my underwear drawer.
Soon, I will be discussing hoarding on my other blog. It's my favorite new show; you know, the one about the hoarders...the one where when I saw the first episode I broke into a clammy sweat. It was part from disgust and part from a paranoia that I, too, may be turning into a hoarder...
More later. Like I said, there's work to be done.
