Prior to owning an IPhone I could never keep track of my schedule. (Let me start with …although this particular blog won’t sound like it, that I’ve gotten better). It wasn’t my day to day routines I missed, they become ingrained. It was the outliers. The rare doctor appointment, meeting, dental appointment; whatever they were, they were often lost to me (even though I wrote them down). I would remember the appt. just as the scheduled time was about to pass. I would get a moment of deja vu, followed by panic, some choice words, an adrenaline fight or flight rush, and then an attempt to hurry out the door. I’d usually make it to the appointment only moments late. On other occasions like this morning…well… (I need to repeat that)… well, (sigh), the window of opportunity passed. I missed an appointment big time. Now I sit here filled with embarrassment over the missed appointment. To make matters wors
e it is one that I’d scheduled missed and rescheduled for acupuncture. Chris, my acupuncturist is patient and kind with me when I miss an appointment. But, I give up! I put the appointment in my phone, she sent me a reminder yesterday, and then when I got up to a house full of people this morning and out of town guests who were hungry I instead cooked breakfast for them and not until 11:00 when Chris’s text arrived did I realize…Oops I did it again, but not the all cheery Britney “Oops”, I’m more the F%$@ and S&@$ and other expletives kind of Oops. Thank God everyone had left the house after breakfast and no one was here to hear me. Or that would have been embarrassment number 2 for the day; and the day is still young.
I despise the feeling of panic and being out of control. One would think I’d be better at avoiding it. Perhaps learn from my mistakes. The thing is there just always seems to be so much to keep track of. So much to keep lined up in order to keep my sanity and at times I fail at it.
Our house is a busy house. Every time a bedroom empties at our house, another child is waiting in line to move back home and calls dibs. This sounds like excuses, but really I don’t think I’m headed there. I’m just working on sorting out the why and how of my erred ways, so maybe I can avoid the same mistakes in the future. One can hope. Hope is optimism and I refuse to succumb to defeat. I had an alarm set for this appointment even. Let me check that…I’m sure I put it in my phone. What? What? I’m sure I put that in my calendar. “News Flash”: The IPhone can’t help when you skip the steps to keep organized. And there was my downfall.
Reset got started because I’m really no good at this. This slowing down, taking a step back, taking care of me. This morning’s a perfect example…Acupuncture appointment for grief relief vs. cooking breakfast for others. I recognize how much I need to grow in this area. I recognize how much I suck at taking breaks. And it’s not just this cycle of my life that suddenly caught up with me. No. It was this way when I was a single mom of 3 young daughters, and as a college student with so much to prove. Every stage of my life as a women has “caregiver” “overachiever” in there somewhere. I love life and there are always a million things I can’t wait to fill it up with. I’m on spring break from my job right now, and i couldn’t wait to have time to get to those other things… like this, Blog writing.. So empty space doesn’t exist. I fill up my space and forget to slow down. So I need to be intentional. I need to slow down from time to time. And I know I’m not alone in this, because I have some great girlfriends and I watch them do the same.
So Reset for today? No time…Gotta pack for tomorrow’s vacation!
But on the plane tomorrow…it’s headphones on, music, meditation, reading, breathing and allowing myself to reset and be present.
p.s. (I followed through on that last line!)
