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Wednesday, February 10, 2010

Time to remodel?

I was reading a bunch of blog entries from bloggers that went to the Blissdom blog conference in Nashville recently. One of the blogs I came across as I hop scotched my way across the web was remodelingthislife.com. I haven't even read the blog or the post yet -- but when it splashed across the home page the name of the blog struck me. "Remodeling this life."

Boy do I feel like I need to do that. Remodel. This. Life.

Today I reverted to the condition I was in a year ago -- crying in the car on the way home from work; needing help turning off my brain at night; clenching my jaw so that my teeth hurt (resulting in a constant headache); needing help sleeping; consuming vast amounts of Diet Coke; eating sweets like there's no tomorrow. Slap that happy face on it and continue on. (Just don't dry your pants in the dryer, 'cause they're getting snug on account of all the junk food and chocolate you're inhaling.)

Amy Powers, a blogger whose site visit frequently, recently said, "If things appear okay on the outside, then things are okay. Even if everything inside is about to topple over." I can identify with that. Lately I'm having a harder time doing the whole keep on, keeping on thing, and my happy(ish) facade is fraying at the edges. Again.

Seriously? I'm back here again? Until yesterday I thought I was doing OK. Making progress in... well, in what exactly? Making progress in not crying all the time? Making progress in not needing a sleep aid every night? Making progress in not feeling like I was going to heave a melt-down in my cube every day? Making progress in WHAT? Really what? Am I making progress, or am I just sweeping my dissatisfaction under the run and ignoring it?

Am I putting my hands over my ears and shouting "I can't HEAR you," to myself as I rock back and forth in a dark corner? Hello, self? Are you listening? Please note that I'm not any happier in my cube now than I was a year ago. I'm not any more satisfied with the direction of my life. I'm not happy choosing to spend 40 hours a week in a cube with no view. (And yes, as I'm bemoaning all this, I do realize that it's a choice I make to stay. A conscious decision. I choose it because we've got bills to pay in our living-on-credit life. Once again, my choice. So suck it up, you whiner.)

So, I'm making progress in what exactly? Right now I can't name a thing.

It was just (barely) over a year since a bunch of my co-workers got the axe. This experience in "right-sizing" was something that capped off a few crappy years and disillusionment with my job in general, and while things hadn't improved at work in these last 12 months, I thought I was doing OK. As I said to my boss, we're all "settling into the misery."

I'm sure she said something constructive in response, but what stuck with me was how wrong it was in general. The idea that we should be 1) settle into the misery, and 2) be OK with that because it pays the bills. Being settled in misery is not what I want to spend the majority of my time awake doing. And then came Monday.

On Monday at our department meeting we found out that there was another round of job cuts and "restructuring" effective immediately. More co-workers are now former co-workers. Other co-workers got the shaft. Oh the stress. It's terrible, but I choose to be there. That's something I have to accept: I choose to stay. That's not to say I'm choosing the stress, or to be stressed out -- but that seems to be something that I can't control (Lord knows I'm strung a bit tightly, and I'm sure that's not helping at all, right?). I choose it. I own it, and really, I'd like to continue owning my house... so I choose it.

Dang, I'm making crappy choices. Being the grown up bites. :) So back to remodeling -- I think it's time to draft my remodeling plans for this life. (Picture me deep in thought now, I'm working on it).

photo courtesy of hellofelix.com

Blue skies!

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