My mindset about change is one of those things that can wreak havoc on my life if I don’t keep it in check. Even the simplest thing – like shifting my schedule by an hour – can send me into a complete tizzy. It might start out with me realizing the change isn’t working out as well as I thought, but by the end of the thought process, the entire world is about to cave in because of it! “I’m not sleeping well with this new schedule change. I can’t possibly accept less sleep every day! I can’t possibly learn to deal with less energy every day! I can’t possibly start every day with so little energy and patience! How will I ever get through life like this?! Clearly, good sleep is gone forever and life as I knew it is gone for good”!
OK OK – calm down, self! Change doesn’t have to be THAT bad, and change sure as hell doesn’t have to be bad forever! Keep things in perspective, drama girl!
My default state is to assume ALL change is BAD change until proven otherwise. Because I know that I naturally resist change -I am trying to make an honest effort at being open to change. Because I’m giving a lot of new things a try, there are going to be some things that just don’t work out. So, I need to learn how to speak up! So many times in life, I’ve just continued on with a commitment just because I committed to it… resenting everyone involved all the while… when in reality, everyone would have been better off if I had just said “Ya know what, I need to tweak this a bit” or “This isn’t actually working the way I expected”.
Hubby has started a new routine – which is amazing. He’s super organized and super motivated. I love seeing this new routine work so well for him. Of course, when one partner changes their routine, it also changes the other partner’s routine too. He’s awesome and realized that up front – so we worked together to come up with what seemed like a decent compromise – which shifted our sleep schedule by an hour. This whole sleep schedule change isn’t working out the way I thought it would, and we had to make some tweaks to what we originally planned. In the past, I would have just trudged along miserably until the lack of sleep caught up with me. Then, I would have resented hubby (even though I never told him there was a problem and he never had any say in me continuing to live with it). Inevitably, there would have been some stupid argument about shoes being left out or how I hate our dishes or why does his stupid pocket knife always fall and hit my foot every time I do his laundry! And poor hubby would be all “Wow, I had no idea the pocket knife was such a big deal” and I’d be all like “Yeah, this sleep schedule fucking sucks” and then we’d be all like “Oh. This has nothing to do with a pocket knife”. So – speaking up and working together to resolve the issue totally avoided the whole pocket knife fight! See- that’s growth! Look at that!
Like I mentioned before, I want my happiness to be intentional, not accidental. Part of that is listening to my body and what I need and being open and honest about that. I’m hoping over time, I’ll start to see the difference between “change is scary as fuck” vs. “no, THAT change just sucks”, but in the meanwhile, I’m going to practice speaking up and being true to myself when something inst’ working out.
New and Shiny Me 