Transitions

My sister wither her six kids is always talking about how rough transitions are on them. Transitions can be a wide range of things from simple things like dinnertime or time to go home from the library or bigger things like a new school year or moving. Her kids all react differently to transition but some of the "symptoms" can be more violence, more sass, munching, clinginess, or tantrums. Watching my sister's kids and other kids, I have come to agree with my sister. Transitions are hard.
This week I returned from a 2+ week vacation (visiting said sister) and have realized that I need to confront my future for real now. I was super grumpy and I was grumpy because I wasn't being productive (only consuming) and I realized transitions aren't just hard on kids...

 Is it any wonder the transition between land and sea can be so rough?

Growing into Similarity

When I was little I would always tease my mother because she was always cold and I wasn't. Now I'm always cold too and so now I often wear overshirts just like she and my dad do.
I went on a road trip the past couple of days and I really enjoyed looking at the scenery. The rolling hills of winter wheat and the winding mountain pass alongside a spring flood high river surrounded by pine trees were beautiful. I remember road trips where my mom was always telling us kids to stop reading and enjoy the scenery and I always thought, "why bother."
I think I'm a lot like both of my parents and some of the things that seemed different between us when I was a child now seem like they were an age thing not a personality thing.

Momentum

In a book I read recently one of the main characters was a career soldier (Dalinar in Oathbringer by Brandon Sanderson). He is constantly thinking about how momentum affects a fight or battle. Once you have the momentum if you can keep it up it means that you will most likely win the fight.
Sometimes I just really don't want to write or work on whatever but often once I start I can get into it and it ends up being a good experience.
However, on occasion it just feels like I'm slugging through the whole thing and it's more or less torture.
In physics if you have a frictionless environment (these are only common in physics text books, not real life) once an object has momentum it continues moving indefinitely. When there is friction or other forces on the object it naturally slows down much faster, but depending on how much velocity and mass it has it can overcome friction (depending on the friction) for sometime.
So to return to momentum in life maybe when just starting doesn't seem enough it is because the task is not frictionless and the velocity of starting isn't enough to keep going.

Starting Over

This is my high school attempt at an impressionistic painting. I really struggled with the style but after getting in some of the colors my teacher finally said that in one tree I was finally getting it and I should use it as an example and redo all of my other trees. I did so and when I finished I showed it to her. The first tree looked oddly out of place. "Redo that tree" my teacher said, "but that is the one you told me was good, the one you told me to base my others on." I protested. "Yeah" she said, "but note you really have it, and that one looks bad." So I started over on that tree, and I'm glad I did. It was a lot better. 


This week I started working on a new database. I thought about adapting the tables that were already there but quickly decided it would be far easier just to start over, which I did. I now have a new database but without any data... I'm working on that.
Awhile ago I was working on a digital drawing and I asked my roommate for her opinion. She said that the cloak, which I had thought I'd finished, was off. So I avoided working on the whole project for a week or two and then finally went back to it, and started over on the cloak. It's much better.
Starting over is obnoxious, and something that is easy to put off or avoid but I've had great success when I do start over because sometimes it just needs to be done, even though it might seem like more work, but it is probably less work then patching up the old. Maybe the secret is knowing when you need to restart.

Allergies

"I'm allergic to boring."
The words, half-bragging, half-joke, made me think. They were probably written flippantly, just trying to portray that the speaker liked adventure, fun, entertainment. But as usual, I think too much. What sort of things are boring? Laundry. Washing dishes. Babysitting (unless it's stressful or a disaster). Data entry. Work. Digging. Reading assignments. School. Church. All of these things can be boring (not always but sometimes). Much of living a successful life is living through boredom (or perhaps finding the joy in little things so that life doesn't become boring. Even when you can find the joy in little things I still think that much of life can be kind of boring so it's important to learn to live with it. So if you are allergic to boredom, well maybe you should build up your immunity or something, because you aren't going to get far if you can't handle any.

Too Lazy

The other day my roommate said that her grandmother always says she's "too lazy." Too lazy not to wash the dishes right away. Too lazy not to put stuff away right away etc.This sort of behavior is lazy because if you leave it then things get crusted on, or you trip over stuff etc. My roommate although she could see the wisdom in it decided she was "real lazy" not her grandma's lazy.
My mother repeats the old adage "a stitch in time saves nine" on occasion, usually in regards to sewing but I think the same principle is displayed. I've decided that I agree, especially in regards to doing dishes, partly because I think a kitchen sink full of dishes is rather repulsive. I'm not quite so good at it in regards to other things (like folding my laundry) but I still think it a good principle... and I really am too lazy not to clean up that spilled juice right away.

Consuming and Creating: Part 10: Destruction

This morning my dad and I were talking about self-defeating habits. We all seem to have them. Crazy busy so you procrastinate. Not getting enough sleep so you go to bed late. Depressed and lonely so you hunker down and stay inside by yourself. Feeling discouraged that you aren't accomplishing much so you only do fun (consuming type activities) instead.... It's a real problem.
In the past I've talked about how apathy is in some ways the opposite of creating, because if we don't care enough to create then we might as well consume. This was more in regards to particular practices or things we do, but what about our very beings?
As we were talking about self-defeating habits or in other words, self-destructive habits it made me think of becoming... as in who we are becoming not just a specific practice.
Thus, it seems that when we are self-disciplined (not doing self-defeating things) then we are usually progressing and becoming (creating) a better person while when we are participating in self-destructive behaviors we are losing? destroying? the person that we could be.
Most of the behaviors or decisions I mentioned at the beginning can probably be linked back to a root problem of just not caring enough at that moment to make a better decision (or ignorance I suppose). This apathy then, is in reality destructive, and so to put it dramatically, if I'm not creating a better me I'm destroying the current me.