Decompressing on the downlow

Tags

Carried by a Promise, cartoon series, feta and silverbeet pie, Goldilocks and the Three Bears, little girl giggles, Mojo, new job, Nieces, Papa Bear, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder, PTSD, satire, suppressor, The Wonky Donkey, Tinkerbell, update, world of impermanence, Yoga

A little more street art from my 'hood

 

There’s been the odd hint or two from certain people about my lack of blog posts in recent times. I know.

Well, blame it on all the energy I had to put into surviving the Hellhouse of Horrors, but I’ve been a touch short on inspiration lately.

Thing is, I don’t wanna post just for the sake of posting either, and I do know I sort of owe a few posts that I promised in January – more on Carried by a Promise, and reviews of the two yoga intensives I went to.

So believe me when I tell you that they’re still coming. They are. No really, they are!

I haven’t forgotten my bloggy friends either, believe me. I’m still reading your blogs and commenting when I can and right now, I’m preparing for my first day on the new job (back into contractor mode – I jokingly refer to this as the world of impermanence, which is more of a yogi joke than anything else!) tomorrow morning.

Right now, I’m waiting for my feta and silverbeet pie to finish cooking – my lunch for the next few days.

This weekend has been busy, too. First, there was that glorious experience of reveling in not having to go back to my old job any more, not ever-ever-ever-ever. Once I’d gotten over that, I realised how freakin’ tired I was!

And Saturday afternoon/evening was a family thing for my (currently) youngest niece’s birthday (there’s another niece-ling in the oven right now!). That cheeky lil cutie just turned two and is apparently fascinated by “Tubba” (Tinkerbell). So much fun!

I also had my hands full “doing tricks” (yoga) on command, helping both nieces do some acrobatics of their own, and reading Goldilocks and the Three Bears in my best character voices (you should hear my Papa Bear, it rocks!). Oh, and I was introduced to a very fabulous kid’s book called The Wonky Donkey. It’s rather hilarious and another good one for character voices and other exaggerated noises that elicit perfect little girl giggles! 😉

So today I just kinda collapsed, and thought very hard about writing a post or two but… not. Instead I had a lazy day of enjoying the rain from inside my apartment, eating an incredibly late lunch at one of my favourite local spots, grocery shopping and preparing for tomorrow.

So, I’ll be back soon okay? I just need to get a lil more inspiration mojo back, which will arrive once I’ve recovered from the stress and exhaustion. Because I’m a suppressor of my own “stuff”, in case you hadn’t realised. I’ll put up with ridiculous things for a really long time and sometimes it takes me a while to recognise what’s going on. Then it takes me a little while longer to recover…

Hey, let’s just call that another very handy side-effect of Post Traumatic Stress, shall we?

Anyway, if you draw all of the above on a graph, then I’m somewhere towards the end of that particular timeline, but just not quite there yet.

HOWEVER, I will have something delightfully wicked for you shortly – a brand new cartoon series called “The Yoga Rebel”… *cackles maniacally*

Of course, I’m no artist so my stick figures could be slightly on the ugly side. But ah well, I read Toothpaste for Dinner and understand the irony of bad art and satire, and it will amuse me and hopefully also readers of this here blog. If I haven’t lost y’all yet with my radio silence, that is!

Catch ya on the flip side, folks!

~Svasti xxx

Crash

Tags

Accident, Anxiety, Bike stack, Confusion, Crash, Depression, EMDR, Fear, Gravel rash, Injuries, Intuition, Mojo, Panic attacks, super powers, Unemployed

Been in a funny little funk this week. And its made it hard to write, damnit. Which really doesn’t help matters.

Where there’s movement after a long period of stagnation, often what you get is the discovery of more stuff to deal with. You couldn’t see it before coz there was so much else in the way…

Fell off my bike the weekend before this one. Took a major tumble. I’ve mentioned my clumsiness before… Somehow though, I managed to not break any bones, trash my clothing, and I didn’t wreck my bike. Overall, it was a pretty successful stack (Aussie term for fall/crash).

Returning from my yoga studies course, I was travelling on the footpath (which I don’t do a lot, but this was a busy road), and probably going just a touch too fast (ahem, when would I do that??). So when the broken footpath came into view, it was too late to avoid it. Just beyond this nasty piece of trouble was dirt – not helpful when you’re trying not to skid.

I could see what was gonna happen, and so I called on possibly the only super-power I actually do have… the ability to think clearly as I fall, and do what I can to minimise the end result.

As in, make sure my fingers aren’t in bad places, don’t try to break the fall with an outstretched hand (which can result in broken wrists) and try to relax as much as possible. The opposite of ‘bracing for impact’. Also, I threw myself off my bike, knowing I didn’t really want a handle bar or any other part lodged firmly against my ribs, for example.

‘Course, that doesn’t mean that I got off scot-free. Hardly! As I lay there fully stretched out on my belly, arms in front of me… trying to asses if I was okay, a lovely, well-meaning dude (himself a cyclist) came over to see if I was alright. But then, without warning tried to lift me to my feet, grabbing me under the shoulders while standing in front of me, causing my back to arch upwards… Don’t do that, please, I begged.

He looked offended, but I explained, I need to get up a little more gently. And y’know, its handy to understand if someone is really injured or not, before hauling them up by the shoulders! Rolling to one side and sitting up was much more ideal, once adrenaline stopped pumping so hard and I could start to feel the extent of my injuries.

Thank goodness for cycling gloves, is all I could think while inspecting the trashed palms of my gloves (grateful it wasn’t my hands). Elbows didn’t fair so well, though. The day was warm and I was dressed in an orange North Face t-shirt, not really ideal for cycling (though tempting when you think you’re invincible on a warm day).

Oh yes, it wasn’t pretty.

It was gravel rash.

Both elbows and knees, and my stomach. Found out later I was also gifted with a bruised boob. Ouch!

Left elbow was the worst. But both were nicely mashed up. Blood, dirt, tiny pebbles. Profusely stinging.

And what was that? My left shoulder was putting in a serious complaint. Didn’t have time to think about it too much, coz I was in danger of fainting.

The nice old guy checked my bike was okay and seeing I wasn’t in need of emergency treatment, directed me to a nearby seat. Which I needed, to catch my breath and make sure I was okay.

I needed to regroup if I was gonna cycle another five kilometers home.

Almost there, I dragged my bruised and battered self into the pharmacy conveniently placed on the road home… got pain killers and bandages and stuff from a very unsympathetic looking pharmacist.

Luckily as I said, nothing broken. I did wonder though, where my hot male nurse was… the one who shoulda been there to pick up the pieces!

So, anyway. Here I am, just finished a course of EMDR therapy. I’ll go and see my therapist again in a month. Just to see how things are going.

But on top of the physical meshing of body against pavement… there’s been another sort of crash.

Or, perhaps the best word is… panic.

No job. Again. No income. Limited stores of cash that won’t last forever. The job market is D-E-A-D and I’m not even getting a nibble from applications I’ve sent in! Doom and gloom on the news, unemployment’s jumped x%. Whatever skills I have, they’re only useful as long as there’s demand for them…

But there’s actually a bunch of work in my field in Sydney right now. So what am I doing here, anyway? In Melbourne? With nothing really going for me? The only thing that’s actually working for me here, is my yoga course. The whole move-to-Melbourne-and-become-closer-to-my-family thing was a wash. Of course, there’s my beautiful nieces.

But they aren’t my life. That’s my sister’s family, not mine. As for me? I’m trying to get my life back on track, fighting really hard for that and… its one thing after another.

Not to mention… my mojo has vanished! That little light of intuition, voices in my head that talk to me, tell me stuff… well, its been radio silence almost all of the last couple of weeks.

So what the heck am I doing again? Do I actually have a point, here? I’m not so sure about that right now…

That panic attack it seems, was just waiting for a clearing to have its turn. And so I couldn’t write. Couldn’t do anything much, especially in the last week… and I’m not feeling pulled in any one direction or the other. Nothing to guide me. Nothing.

And that’s where I am, still.

Got ordered out of the house on Friday by a friend… which helped but still, I’m not cool with all this nothingness. Though as a yogini, I darn well should be!

I know, I know. I’m still healing, moving on from demons of the past. Licking my wounds. Give myself a break. Yaadayaadayaada…

~Svasti