Self Discovery

It appears that the lockdown that we’ve been living in for the past several weeks will soon be changing and our lives will once again shift. I, for one, am ready! And, as we plan for the weeks and months ahead, it is a great time to re-evaluate: it is a great time to reset life.

I’m feeling a little like I do when I am coming up to a new year: I want to make plans for the things that I haven’t been able to do lately. But the lockdown has taught me a few things about myself that I want to remember as I make plans for the future.

Social Butterfly or a Loner?

I am a social butterfly and I like to be around people. I always thought of myself as someone who loves to be alone, and I do. Reading and knitting and watching TV all favorite activities, but I enjoy that within a life that includes lots of other time with people. You might say I thrive on social interaction, but I had no idea how much I did until I, someone who lives solo, was locked down.

What this social distancing has taught me is that I like to spend time alone when I am living a super busy, super socially connected life (oh, of course, I do!). When I am surrounded by people and commitments, I love time alone. But when the party is over and alone is all there is, not so much.

Now, with that knowledge (it’s only taken me 64 years to get a good handle on that one) I will move forward in a different way than I have in years past. I really understand that in order for me to be happy alone I need to have that social element integrated into my life as well. Without it, I’m just lonely. As I have time to reset life, I want to keep that knowledge top of mind. I only wish I had figured it out about thirty years ago: it would have saved me a lot of difficulties.

Adversity or Inconvenience?

About ten days into social distancing, I had a meltdown. I was talking with a friend on the phone after a long lonely weekend and with tears in my eyes said, “I don’t think I can do this!” Of course, I did do it, and I got better at it. But I am ashamed to think that just because I had to be alone for a while, even a long while, I was falling apart.

Get a hold of yourself, Paula. Staying at home for several weeks has been an inconvenience, but I didn’t get the disease. I haven’t had a loved one pass away. That’s adversity. While it took me a while to turn my thinking around, I was no more than inconvenienced. When I changed my attitude from boo-hoo to oh-well, I began to enjoy the time I had alone. Adversity or inconvenience? It’s how I frame things in my mind that dictates how I react to them. Lesson learned.

Change Moving Forward?

After all this, how will I change moving forward? How will you change moving forward? What will I do with this time to reset my life? What will you do?

Of course, I can’t wait to squeeze my children! But attitude-wise, I want to be more mindful of how lucky I am that no one in my family and close-friend world got sick.

And, I want to take the lessons I learned about myself and my love of social situations and incorporate them into my everyday life in a healthy and balanced way. It’s about balance. I need to balance my life by including both a busy schedule and downtime. And, I want to do that both in my personal life and my “outside” life. That will be the best way to maintain a happy, healthy daily emotional balance.

Now it’s your turn. What have you learned about yourself during sheltering in place that you will carry over into your regular life? What will you do differently? And what did you really enjoy while you were at home?

Stay safe and healthy!

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In this crazy time, I never know which Paula I am going to be when I awaken: Scared to Death Paula,, Oh Well We Will Get Through This Paula, When I Get It and I Have to Call the Squad How Will They Get Into the Building Paula, or the I’ll Just Use This Time to Learn a New Skill Paula. Really, I have no idea how I am going to feel when I wake up each morning. There have been mornings that as soon as I know where I am my stomach starts to roll with fear. Other days my brain seems to embrace where we are and I feel steadfast and determined and patriotic. But I never ever know what it will be until I begin to feel conscious at dawn.

When I am talking with people over the phone or in a Zoom meeting or Facetime call, and they ask me how I am doing or how I am feeling, I have no answer. I can’t be the only one. My feelings are all over the place and they change daily from hopeful to depressed to anxious then back to hopeful.

I can’t imagine that I am the only one feeling uncertain every night as to what my emotions will be the next day. And that lack of control over myself and my life is driving me crazy. How about you? While I try to get control over my life, that very lack of control sends me into a spin again.

The only thing I can say to you is that I hope you wake up in a better place tomorrow than you did today, and that life continues that way for you during this 2020 pandemic. Things are uncertain and they will be for a while. Here’s the good news: we are strong, seasoned women. We have been through a lot. We are all survivors and will come out on the other side just fine. I know it’s hard not to have control over the direction your life is heading right now, but it will pass. Stay safe and stay healthy.

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I say this to myself all the time, and now I want to put it in print, so I can see it. “Dear Mom, now I get it. I’m sorry.”

My mother died at 49, 15 years younger than I am now. That fact is hard to believe on its own. That my mother has been gone from this world for nearly 40 years is just unbelievable to me.

My parents divorced when I was 15. My father had become an alcoholic and left my mom for the woman who worked at the bar next to his office. It could not have been more cliche. My mom was of course, heartbroken. And, I can honestly say that for the rest of her life, I know that what she missed was our little family, the three of us together. She hated sharing me for the holidays. She hated that I had relationships with the women in my father’s life ( I honestly didn’t know what to do). She loved the life she had built with my dad and how it was gone.

I was, of course, not one bit sympathetic. I was a teenager. I was about myself. I was annoyed and I was trying to be cool and aloof and not care about any of it: obviously I was dealing with my own feelings. I was now a child of divorced parents (that was not the norm back then for sure). I spent a lot of time rolling my eyes at my mother.

Fast forward to my life now. I am her. So many times over the past five years I have wished I could say to my mom, “Sorry, mom. I was a bratty daughter who was so uninterested in your feelings about being divorced from my dad. But, now I get it, all of it. And, I apologize from the bottom of my heart for not being more understanding and for not being a shoulder for you. I apologize.”

I am so lucky to get the opportunity to have a second chance at happiness. I hope I always make my mom proud and I hope, at the end of the day, I can show her and everyone, what a great second chance looks like.

What would you tell your mother if you had the chance? And, if she is still here, what would you like to say to her? Do it!

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