Identity/Parenting & Family

Tentative First Steps

Posted on by noemikjames / 19 Comments

Thank you all for your support on my last post. I was absolutely overwhelmed by your kind and wise words. It never ceases to amaze me how cherished I feel when you all reach out from the ether to hold me up and impart your wisdom. I am humbled. And eternally grateful.

I emailed my pediatrician on Monday–determined after reading all your comments–and she wrote me back almost immediately with the number I needed.

I called the next morning. When the recording welcomed me to the Child and Adolescent Psychiatry phone line my heart sank. I am calling the psychiatry department. For my four year old daughter. Suddenly her whole life flashed before my eyes: Was this just the first of countless mental health professionals she will be forced to consort with? Have I passed some irreparably defective gene onto my unsuspecting little girl?

I see so much of myself in my first born, especially in her emotional meltdowns. I am sure the main reason the empathetic approach has felt productive for me is because I can so easily put myself in her shoes and understand her hurt. I can touch that bottomless pool of loneliness and despair, I know how it waits silently, just below the surface, even though it has no explainable reason for being, even though there are no obvious springs feeding it. I get it when my daughter erupts, for seemingly no reason, into uncontrollable sobs, because that shoulder heaving emotion is ever present in my own emotional landscape, floating in and out of my periphery, waiting for me to turn my head just so.

What terrible mental health legacy have I passed on to my innocent little girl?

I wasn’t sure I was going to call, even after my pediatrician sent me the number. Maybe her outbursts will get better, I reasoned. They usually do, eventually. This is just a rough patch. Surely she’ll be her sweet self soon.

But then I picked her up from school and every moment was a struggle. At one point she was lying across the steps, face red from fury and despair, so angry at me that we don’t play with our neighbors, who she could hear outside. She has never exhibited any interest in knowing our neighbors! What was this tantrum even about?

And looking at her there, so upset over absolutely nothing, my heart broke for her and for the agony she felt. That is when I realized that getting help isn’t about me not being able to handle the hitting, it is about helping her navigating these tidal waves of emotion that threaten to sweep her out to sea.

I need to do this, for my little girl.

I finally got through to the doctor today. I’m schedule for the parent orientation next Thursday at 1pm. There I will learn of the various resources they have to offer. I will be matched with a psychiatrist who will give me tools to deal with my daughter’s “big emotions” as we call them in our house. Eventually she will probably go in to, but not for a little while.

Calling that number was the nadir of my parenting experience. It took all I had to silence (or at least turn down the volume) on the inner voices that insulted my parenting and condemned my emotional shortcomings. I know this is the right thing to do, that it’s a positive step in the right direction, but damn if I’m not devastated that I have to take this step.

Uncategorized

Great Deal

Posted on by noemikjames / 4 Comments

This post popped up in my reader this morning and I wanted to say something about it here because Clutterfree with Kids is one of the books that started me on the path to minimalism. I didn’t realize at the time what a special book this was, because most books on minimalism don’t touch on the unique challenges of embracing a minimalist lifestyle with children. In fact, children aren’t acknowledged in most of the books I read, and there were many times when I wondered how to implement a certain idea when so much of what I was trying to get rid of didn’t actually belong to me.

Right now Clutterfree with Kids is celebrating its one year anniversary and the Kindle edition is only $2.99 for two days. It’s a great deal and a great way to explore the possibility of minimalism in your life. I highly recommend picking up this book if you’re even the least bit interested in getting your clutter under control.

Parenting & Family

Out of my Depth

Posted on by noemikjames / 44 Comments

My daughter is going through something right now. She has been for about a month. It’s been really, really hard.

I never know if what we’re dealing with is normal. I don’t think most parents of 4.5 year olds are dealing with these issues. I don’t think most parents of 4.5 years olds are navigating these kinds of tantrums, this frequently. And yet, even if that is true, does that mean our daughter’s behavior falls outside “normal” parameters?

I’m constantly asking myself, should we be seeking outside help? Can we deal with this on our own? Are we making the right choices to support out daughter in the best ways we can?

I try to fill her cup, but it’s like a sieve. I try to show her empathy but she hits me over and over and over again. I try to set limits but she pushes back constantly. We are navigating the same kinds of behavior we did when she was two and three years, except now she has the language capabilities to really hurt us, in ways that sometimes feel irreparable.

We both feel beaten, like we have already waved the white flag, but in the game of parenting there is no surrender. We just keep getting assaulted, and we can’t lay down and play dead.

Every time I think we should take her to see someone, I wonder what they’d actually do. I mean, sitting there, in a professional’s office, I’m sure my daughter would be fine. What I need is someone to be there when I’m trying to get her to wear her raincoat because it’s pouring outside. What I need is someone to be there when she refuses to eat butter noodles for dinner–and that is one of the few things she actually likes! What I need is for someone to be here when I set a limit and she hits me and kicks me and when that doesn’t work scratches her own face.

Maybe I need to be seeing someone, so that I have the emotional fortitude to deal with this stuff. Because right now, I’m not sure I can.

Even when I think I know what I need to do, I’m not sure I’m strong enough to do it.

{And yes, I see the irony in the fact that I just posted about how good I felt about my change in parenting. The thing is, I do feel good about the changes I’ve made, and I do think parenting my daughter in those ways are what is best for her, but I just don’t know if I have the emotional stamina to be what my daughter needs me to be. I’m feeling so totally and utterly defeated so much of the time. She is just so much, and I feel like so little.}

Home/Life/Minimalism

The Little Details

Posted on by noemikjames / 13 Comments

By this point I’ve read a couple books on minimalism and a few of them have suggested an interesting exercise: If you could start over again, what would your ideal house look like?

The truth is, I have no idea.

So far my movement toward minimalism has been about taking what I have and paring it down to the essentials. I start with an accumulation of stuff and try to end with only those things that I truly love. I haven’t really thought much about what I’d want if I could start all over and recreate my surroundings with only things that bring me joy.

I like my house well enough. It’s nothing special but it’s home. Over the years I have purchased a few things that bring me joy, in an attempt to make my own home the kind of place I’d want to go to if I could get away. We have a memory foam mattress that I cover in sinfully soft sheets. Sinking down into bed each night is one of my favorite moments of the day.

There have been a few pieces around the house that I’ve had to replace since my minimalism project began and I’ve thought long and hard about the question posed above. If I could start all over in this room, what would I want it to look like?

When it became clear that my son was not going tolerate being changed on his table, I delighted in the prospect of getting rid of it. It had been falling apart for years and the drawers were constantly falling off their runners. I knew I wanted a chest of that matched the blue and brown motif in his room, but after extensive searches online I hadn’t found anything I loved that also fit in our budget.

I ended up making it myself.

I bought a simple five-drawer pine chest from IKEA and two shades of blue paint. The whole project took way longer than I anticipated and in the end I felt I had gotten in over my head, but thankfully I was thrilled with the results.

Now I have one piece in my son’s room that is exactly what I want. It absolutely answers the question above and brings me immense joy.

chest of drawersThis project was completed months ago and I’ve had a couple other opportunities to add details to a room that bring my joy. When we replaced our TV stand and added another shelving unit I chose some turquoise highlights in our living room, which had been dominated by black. Now a shelving unit, the storage bins below the TV and the throw on the old glider add some great color to the space.

A couple of weeks ago the cold water handle on our bathroom sink faucet just broke off in my hand. The plumber informed me I’d have to get a whole new faucet. I was annoyed by the cost of the whole project and went to Home Depot hoping to spend as little money as possible. At first I grabbed the lowest priced faucet, but then couple of models in a darker “burnt bronze” caught my eye and I suddenly realized how much the silver faucet in our bathroom had bothered me: it didn’t sit well with the dark accents in the marble counter top or the wood of the mirror above and cabinet below.

The minute I saw the faucet I eventually got I knew I was going to splurge a bit on this purchase. Sure it was an extra $70, but I use the bathroom sink so many times a day, isn’t it worth it for washing my hands to bring me a little extra joy?

IMG_4388 It’s not much–I still hate the cheap vanity in there–but I’ve always wanted a faucet like this and it brings a little joy to a room that I spend a lot of time in and that I’ve never loved much. I’m also so glad we got rid of the silver–it did nothing for the small space. The color of this faucet works much better.

IMG_4391There is still much about my house that I don’t love, but as I change these small details I find I take so much more joy in my home. I am constantly asking myself what I would do with a room if I could start all over, and while I rarely have any moments of true inspiration, it’s fun to wonder.

Of course this line of thinking can be extended to the rest of my life. If I could build my life from the ground up, what would I fill my days with? My uncertainty in answering this is paralyzing, but I keep asking myself the question just the same. I know I can’t overhaul everything in my life, but maybe I can change some of the small details to bring more joy to my days.

What would your dream house look like? What small details in your space bring you joy?

Parenting & Family

Changing the Way I Parent

Posted on by noemikjames / 7 Comments

I read two books in the past several months that have totally changed the way I parent. I won’t say parenting is necessarily easier or more enjoyable now, but for the first time I feel like I’m making the best choices for me and my family.

The first book was Dr. Laura Markham’s Peaceful Parent, Happy Kids and the second was Dr. Shefali Tsabary’s The Conscious Parent. I’m not going to try to encapsulate the teachings of these books as I know I wouldn’t do either justice (and would probably end up doing them injustice), but I will say that together they have transformed not only the way that I parent, but also the way that I view parenthood. I wish I had read both years ago.

Changing the way I approach parenting has been difficult. And exhausting. New approaches aren’t yet habits and sometimes I’m not sure how to proceed. While I feel better equipped to handle many challenges with my daughter, others remain huge frustrations.

Hitting continues to be an issue in our home. My daughter is 4.5 years old and she still hits me out of anger and frustration. She doesn’t have a hitting problem at school and she rarely hits her younger brother, but she goes through phrases where she hits me (what feels like) constantly. I have been increasingly frustrated with this behavior and I recently purchased an hour long talk by Dr. Laura Markham on Setting Effective Limits to renew my confidence in my ability to deal with this issue.

About an half way into the talk I began to fear I had wasted my money. There didn’t seem to be anything here that I hadn’t read from her before: she suggested the best way to set limits was to create a strong connection with your child through quality time and play, to make a game of undesirable tasks and redirect when necessary, to set firm and consistent limits with empathy and understanding and to maintain a strong connection when doing so. She advised against “time-outs,” insisting that “bad behavior” was a call for more connection and suggesting “time-ins” to reestablish connection when a child acts up. I learned early on that time-outs were not affective with my daughter, so I was on board avoiding those, but I was waiting anxiously for Dr. Markham give tips on how to incorporate consequences meaningfully.

Finally consequences were mentioned, but I was surprised by the context. Dr. Markham believes that consequences aren’t necessary and that really they are just another form of arbitrary punishment. This surprised me, as I have always been a big proponent of consequences and have believed they are a necessary component of discipline. I turned off the talk, unconvinced. Were my consequences really just punishments, masquerading as something more meaningful? How was I supposed to set effective limits without employing consequences?

This is when I fell back on what I learned in The Conscious Parent. Instead of becoming defensive and shutting down to protect my ego, I approached the following days with an open mind and heart, investigating the times I used consequences with curiosity.

It turns out that sometimes, when I use what I consider consequences, I am actually enforcing a limit. When my daughter refuses to eat dinner and I tell her there will be no other food served, but she can come back and finish her dinner until bedtime, that is setting a limit. When I refuse to give her goldfish later, but remind her that she can finish her dinner (and offer to sit with her while she does) I am holding firm on my limit. When later, after she has brushed her teeth, I refuse her request to finish her dinner, I am again holding firm on my limit. These are not consequences, as I originally viewed them.

When my daughter calls me into her room at night, screaming that she wants me to cuddle in her bed, despite the agreement we’ve made that I will give her hugs and kisses and even sing a song but not lay next to her (I’ve been falling asleep in there and it’s really messing with my already limited sleep), saying that I will leave if she keeps screaming and doesn’t listen is not only an unnecessary consequence, but a threat. In fact, I’m threatening to do the one thing that would be most upsetting to her, all because, in that moment, I am overwhelmed by her show of emotion and want to control not only how she acts, but by extension, her actual feelings. It’s understandable that I’d throw down the gauntlet in this situation–I’m exhausted and I just want to go back to sleep. The last thing I want to do is reach down into myself and access a pool of legitimate empathy so I can be there for her in a meaningful way.

This happened last night. I made the threat that I was going to leave and then immediately recognized my error and retracted the statement. I stayed with my daughter while she railed against my limit of not getting into the bed for a full twenty minutes. The entire time I showed her nothing but empathy and eventually she told me I could leave and that she would snuggle her blankie instead.

It felt like a win, even through the haze of absolute exhaustion.

I still have a lot of work to do, but I’m getting better at keeping my cool and accessing my empathy–it helps that my daughter and I are scarily similar, and most of the time I can easily understand why she’s so upset–and I can see that our relationship is changing for the better. We’re still dealing with some of our same issues, like hitting when she is angry or frustrated, but I’m content standing firm in my limit of not hurting others without needing to add unnecessary punitive action. I hope that over time, especially as she matures, our connection will be strong enough to see us through whatever challenges arise and I’m excited to see how this kind of parenting nurtures my relationship with my son.

Uncategorized

Struggling to Show Up

Posted on by noemikjames / 14 Comments

I’m struggling to show up in this space. I sit down, with a blank square ready and waiting for my words, but there are none. Throughout the day I think about posts I could write, topics I could tackle, things I could say, but when sit down to write, nothing comes. It’s all tumbleweeds and dust.

I will admit that lately I can’t seem to shake that feeling of, What’s the point? I write the same thing, over and over again, and to what end? Where does it get me? What is point of all those words?

It doesn’t help that I have so little time. Most days it’s simply impossible for me to write. The more days I’m kept from writing when I actually want to write, the more likely it seems I’ll have a hard time writing when I finally have time for it.

I don’t know what the answer is, and I’m not sure why I’m writing this. Maybe if I put it out there the problem will dissipate? Or maybe if I tear these 200 words from myself and force them onto the page I will feel I’ve won in some small way.

Whatever my reason, I’m writing this. And I suppose that’s something.

Do you ever have a hard time writing?

How do you conjure words when it seems there are none?

Health & Well Being/Parenting & Family

An Interlude

Posted on by noemikjames / 5 Comments

I’m not going to deny that Wednesday was one of the harder days I’ve experienced. I felt so ill, and I had two little people who felt just as bad, that needed me. Wednesday was a hard, hard day. But we got through it.

By the time my husband came home sick Wednesday afternoon, I was feeling better. Earlier in the day I had been able to sneak in an hour nap and I was keeping down my saltines. The pain killers had my body aches under control and I was able to power through until both kids went to bed.

It sucked waking up at 5am Thursday morning to drag my sorry ass to work to get sub plans ready. It took longer than I expected and by the time I got home my son was already awake. I have to admit, a part of me appreciated that his dad got a taste of what the day before had been like for me. He never has to care for the kids when he is sick.

Thursday I felt much better and I was able to care for my sick family. There were lots of snuggles, lots of listening to music on the bed, lots of sitting with my kids while they played quietly. Lots of watching my son’s face light up when I held up something he loves. Lots of lying with my daughter’s hot body pressed against mine, watching movies while I smoothed back her hair.

Of course there were other, less savory moments. The diapers have been disgusting and I’m sick of cleaning up puke. But those quiet moments were really nice, and in the end I was almost thankful to have that time with my family, that still, quiet time where we had no plans, no agenda, no reason to worry about anybody but ourselves.

I’ve been feeling kind of down about parenting lately. It’s not my kids, or my husband or anything specific, I’m just sick of the relentlessness of it all, of constantly tending to other people’s needs, of setting boundaries and holding them over and over and over again. Sometimes it feels like I’m supposed to be a rock that my kids throw themselves against again and again. And while I love the ocean, I know what happens to the rocks that face the crashing waves. If they get worn down, how can I expect I won’t?

I’ve been trying to pull myself out of the funk, embracing the gratitude I feel for my two children, but it’s been hard when they make every moment a battle.

These two days of just being with them, taking care of them and feeling like I was doing a good job at it, that felt good. I was reminded of what wonderful people my children are, and how much I love them. Of how much I love my family.

Of course now I have to go back to work and deal with the repercussions of my two day absence. My house is a disaster area and my kids and husband still aren’t feeling great. But I’m still somehow thankful for that two day interlude, for the reminder of what is most important and why.

Life

Sick

Posted on by noemikjames / 5 Comments

First my son threw up, but we thought the bacon he ate earlier that day was too rich. But then he threw up again the next day and we started to wonder if maybe it was something more.

On Monday my daughter’s school called asking me to pick her up; she woke up from her nap with a fever of 101.

On Tuesday my husband stayed home with her. Though she still had a cough (as she has for four months now), she seemed to be doing much better and she never spiked a fever and we assumed she’d be back at school the next day.

When I got home from work my son threw up all over my bed.

Then Tuesday night I started feeling nauseous. Queue me throwing up all night. A lot.

I didn’t sleep much Tuesday night. At 5:30am I got a call from my in-laws, who were also worshiping the porcelain god. I was sick with the flu and there would be no childcare for my son. Once my daughter woke up, it was clear she’d be staying home too.

My husband lasted until 3:30pm before he came home, as sick as I was.

My daughter had a fever all day. My son threw up his dinner, after the third bite.

Today all four of us will be home, sick with the flu.

(But not before I drag my ass to school at 6am to get everything ready for a second sub day.)

It’s going to be awesome.

Connection/Identity

Then and Now

Posted on by noemikjames / 16 Comments

Lori’s comment on Thursday’s post prompted me to pull up my Stumbling Gracefully archives and see if I had written a post on this very thing so many years ago.

It turns out that I had, indeed written such a post and I evidently felt a lot surer of myself and my ability to navigate that fine line between acceptance and action back then. Of course, my big example of navigating that line was my acceptance of myself as a bad housekeeper. While I was quite aware that berating myself for house dirty my house was wouldn’t inspire me to get off my ass and do anything about it, I clearly didn’t know how to use that acceptance to eventually spur myself to action. What I didn’t know then is that I would accept that shitty house for the next two and a half years, before I finally made the huge changes necessary to get the clutter under control.

But that post is not why I sat down to write this one.

Instead, this post is about the surprising barrage of swirling emotions I felt as I read through other posts (and the comments on those posts) from my February 2012 archives.

I wrote two pieces that month about embarking on TTC#2. Those were hard to read, especially knowing what that year would bring. Then there was a ping back on one of those posts to an October 2012 piece that revisited those initials fears after nine months of failure. In October I was admitting to myself that we might need to take next steps. I had scheduled an appointment with an RE and was revving up for the dietary overhaul that I believe helped me get pregnant with my daughter. I was feeling very defeated and incredibly unsure of what the future might bring.

As I read over those posts, I noticed a really incredible symmetry. February of 2013 is when I learned I was pregnant, despite not trying due to wonky cycles after my HSG. And of course in October of 2013 my son was born. Reading those posts in 2012 and knowing what was coming in 2013 was a strange experience. On the one had I felt sad for myself, remembering how hard that year was, and yet on the other hand, the struggle meant something different through the lens of knowing what was to come.

There were other posts in February 2012. Gutwrenchingly painful posts that I hadn’t expected to come across. Those were really hard to read.

But what really struck me from February of 2012 was the community interaction I saw taking place. I know that things have changed–have been continually changing–since I started blogging in 2009, but it’s been a long time since I went back and witnessed it from this vantage point. It was clear from my writing then that I felt I was part of a community and ot was clear from the comments that others felt that way too.

I don’t really feel that way anymore.

I still read the blogs of many of the people who commented on my posts in 2012 (and some of them still read mine) and we exchange comments–and in some cases FB messages and emails–back and forth. I feel significant connections to many of the women I read–I consider them dear and very real friends, even though we’ve never met in real life. But that feeling of being a part of something bigger than myself? That is gone.

Before the blogging community felt like a net, like I was connected to everyone, even if I only “knew” them tangentially, like the whole community would be there to catch me if I fell. Now it’s more like individual threads stretching out into the distance, disappearing into the hazy ether, almost swallowed by the gapingly empty space around them.

I will admit, I felt a pang of loss as I recognized what used to be. I had forgotten how it felt back then; while some aspects of the dissolution of our community occurred in fits and starts, much of it happened so gradually that I didn’t realize the extent of the erosion. Reading those posts was like looking back on the photo album of a certain time in my life and realizing how long it had been since I’d seen the people with me in the pictures.

Life is change. Everything changes. One of the amazing things about a blog is that it provides a record, not only of one’s thoughts but the interaction those thoughts inspired. It provides a road map of the back and forth that transpired, of the exchange of ideas and opinions, of the support given and received. In providing that record, our blogs expose the enormity of that inevitable change.

In so many ways, I’m thankful for the transformation of our community, or at least the part of it I belonged to, because that transformation was brought about by the realization of dreams. Our community was born of longing, suffering and loss, and it transformed through resolution, and in many cases, triumph and joy. We were a net ready to catch those who fell, but we disentangled ourselves as the chance of falling became less and less and the net was no longer a necessity.

Disposing of so many of the artifacts of my past has brought into sharp focus the undercurrent of change that remains the only true constant, and the sometimes shocking realization that we don’t recognize how extensive that change can be. Looking back at old albums from college, I barely recognize the person I was in my early twenties and I’m strangely unattached to that woman and her experiences. She is a part of me and I’m thankful for all she lived and learned, but I feel no need to grasp at the remnants of her life, the things that held so much importance for her. They don’t belong to me and I have no reason to keep them.

I suppose that is how I ultimately felt looking back at the February 2012 posts. The community captured in the amber of those archives doesn’t belong to me, it belonged to the woman I was when I was struggling through family building after loss. That community isn’t something I can lay claim to and mourn the loss of, but a gift which arrived exactly when I needed it, and provided precisely what I required at the time.

I hope that community still exists out there, for the women who need it now. I hope they feel so entangled with each other that their net is strong and ready to catch them if they fall, or simply need to rest. I hope they find strength there, in the understanding and empathy.

I hope they find exactly what they need, just like I did not so many years ago.

How do you remember your blogging community? What does it feel like now?

Minimalism

Navigating Acceptance and Action

Posted on by noemikjames / 14 Comments

Inevitably, when I write a post about how much I’m struggling to make hard changes in my life, I get comments (and even some emails) with gentle suggestions to cut myself some slack. I appreciate the reminder that accepting myself as I am is an important step, one I have to embrace before I can move forward.

I absolutely believe in the power of acceptance, in the freedom of acknowledgement without judgement. I am working hard to approach myself with compassion and loving kindness in the wake of some really difficult confessions (to myself and others) about behaviors I am not proud of.

I am no longer ashamed of my compulsive spending, nor the fact that I lied to my husband about it. I have owned who I am, the choices I’ve made and the consequences they have wrought for my family. I am working hard to rectify the damage I’ve done and to change so that I won’t inflict further financial harm on our family.

I am also working hard to embrace minimalism, a mindset that is helping me control my compulsive spending. For me embracing minimalism is not just about curbing the flow of things into the house, but purging that which we already own.

I’ve been working really hard on all of this for the past four months and I won’t lie, it’s been difficult. I never feel satisfied by the progress I make around the house; every thing is 50-75% finished and I cringe as areas that I worked hard to declutter fall again into disarray. I know if I had a weekend’s worth of uninterrupted time I could get to that place where I could manage the daily mess, but I also know I’ll never have that time to dedicate to this process.

In the few hours a week that I can allot for purging our unnecessary stuff, I find myself oscillating confusedly between acceptance and action. In my attempt to accept our situation without judgement, I find it hard to push myself to do the hard work of making changes. In the past my frustration and annoyance has propelled me forward. In their absence (or attempted expulsion) I’m finding it hard to motivate.

I’ve encountered similar obstacles on the compulsive spending front. For four weeks I’ve been great about not buying things, and my most recent credit card is proof of how little I’ve spent. But in the last couple of days I actually had to order something from Ama.zon (at the recommendation of my therapist) and then there were some things I truly had to get at Tar.get and I swear it was like taking that first drink after a prolonged dry spell. Suddenly there was all sorts of stuff I “had” to get, like some DVDs to show at school and stickers for when my kids win at Bingo. Do I need to buy those things? No. But I wanted to, very much.

When I slipped a little and bought the DVDs for my Spanish class (DVDs that will be great, but aren’t necessary by any stretch), I was quick to cut myself some slack and forgive myself for my mistake. The problem is that in doing so, I felt the pull to buy other unnecessary but useful stuff for my classroom growing stronger. If I truly forgive myself every time I mess up, how do what is the incentive to not mess up in the first place?

Having two kids and a full time job is kicking my ass something fierce. There are days when I can barely get through the things that absolutely HAVE to get done and still manage five hours of sleep. On those days, I understand the value of accepting that I still haven’t tackled the kitchen and it’s causing me stress. But on the day when I have an hour during my son’s nap and all I want to do is sleep myself, it’s hard to know what is the right move. Do I rest and accept that I just didn’t have the energy to be productive that day? Or do I push myself to sort (and then dump most of) the mismatched Tupperware? If I accept that I was too tired, when will I ever have the energy to actually accomplish anything?

So this is my dilemma. I just can’t seem to figure out how to embrace acceptance while still maintaining my productivity. If you have any words of wisdom on this subject, I’m all ears. I honestly don’t know how to do it.

Which are you better at: acceptance or action? How do balance both?