Keep calm and carry on

I've been loving this slogan for the past few days, as it pertains to recovery. There's a fascinating story behind it. You can read all about it at the Wikipedia entry.

Moving beyond the "britishness" of the phrase, it seems to carry a certain mindfulness to it in both the simplicity and the power of two short phases.

Keep calm - What does it mean to keep calm? To me, it means not getting too high or too low, whatever the circumstances. When something unexpected happens, good or bad, you don't blow it out of proportion.

I don't see this "calm" as avoiding emotions entirely, but keeping a perspective and an emotional state that is optimal for maintaining recovery. When I lose my composure, my "calm," I do stupid things, usually. Calm is the realization that emotions and circumstances are fluid things that change, and adjusts expectations accordingly.

Carry on - One thing that often happens when I lose my "calm" is I get paralyzed with fear or inaction. I literally avoid doing things that I need to do. The simplest path through that paralysis is persistence - keep on keepin' on, as the saying goes.

On the other hand, if I get too excited, I do stupid things as well, like splurge spending money or eating or worse. That is not "carrying on" either. It is an abnormal state of activity - hyper-activity, if you will.

The key thing for me, then, is to maintain steady progress forward. Carry on with the normal state while circumstances and emotions ebb and flow.

Is this easy? No. Easy is letting go of calm and doing whatever my emotional state dictates. But things worth having don't come easy. As someone wise has said, Simple doesn't mean easy.

Keep calm and carry on.

Encouragement Song: Family Picture

I like this song. It's upbeat and has a good message. The band is called Donna the Buffalo. Lyrics below.

The world is a wonderous puzzle
everyone a piece and every piece fits
every piece is alive making energy
energy pulls the pieces together
into a round ball
and there is love
it's a round ball
and there is love


The ball jumps the ball rolls
The ball lives in the moment I am told
The ball pumps and rolls with the flow
The ball laughs as it bounces


CHORUS
Sure as the sunrise it doesn't matter the shape of the hat
It all fits together in a family picture
and every wallÒs got room for that


Every piece is a part of the whole
No one piece more important than the rest
So stand up, take a number
Every piece here's got someplace to go
It's a round ball
and there is love
It's a round ball
and there is love
there is love


CHORUS

BRIDGE
Hey there look at you you got nothin' else to do
you got any bright ideas?
Tumbleweed rolling by
catch the dust up in your eye
saddle up the grey and ride out
CHORUS

Boundaries

One of the things that kept me in chaos over the last few years was boundaries. Specifically, I had none. Part of recovery is setting boundaries.

Over the last week or so, I've been quietly constructing some small boundaries around parts of my life. These boundaries are helpful to keep me focused on things that are important and not get sidetracked. I will give an example of one small, but important, boundary for me: email.

I get a lot of email. Lots of it is from mailing lists, etc. Well, over the last few months, I let it pile up (wonder why that happened?). About two weeks ago, I had over 1700 unread emails in my account. So I set up a goal: I would clear out 100 unread emails a day until I got things under control. 100 might sound like a lot, but, like I said, a lot are stuff I don't read, so I just delete those.

So far, I've been successful with this goal, but only because, I think, I put some boundaries around it. These are the boundaries:
I will not clear out emails except during dedicated email time during work hours.
I will not clear out emails on weekends
I will not clear out more than 100 emails a day.

Each of those small boundaries is a way for me to say "no" to something. Which is important, because saying no there means I can say "yes" to something else that is important, like free time, my music, my online friends, other stuff I need to do for work, etc.

And, by maintaining those boundaries day by day, I am building up my "boundriceps" through practice. The goal is that when a big boundary needs to be established, I will be better equipped to do so because I've been training with smaller ones.

Ultimately, our whole life is an exercise in boundary-setting. The whole world is crying out for your attention, and if you don't set boundaries, the world will take as much as you can give - and then some. I'm just now learning how to set those boundaries effectively.

(a side note: I planned to have this post finished yesterday, but wasn't able to get to it. I could have pushed to finish it, but that would have gone beyond a boundary I'd set to not overdo it. So it's finished today, and I don't feel overwhelmed)

Obstacles

One of the things I have to learn in recovery is how to fill all the time that I used to spend unproductively destroying my life. As you can imagine, that's a lot of time. And it also means learning new ways to interact with the world around me. I'm an introvert by nature, so that's a hard thing too.

So there are two big hurdles that seem to crop up: boredom and loneliness.

In the recovery program I'm pursuing, they talk about a Vitally Absorbing Creative Interest. This is a hobby or pursuit that you can take after with a passion in such a way that it takes up some of that 'extra' time, and releases stress as well. The types of VACI's are as varied as the stars in the sky. But when people are new in recovery, it seems like we can't figure out how to find a VACI. I think often, the real obstacle to finding a VACI or defeating boredom is within ourselves.

The first thing we do is close off anything new. 'I don't want to try something new.' This is the quickest way to shut off a path away from boredom. I used to hear this a lot when I was in church, "the 7 words that mean a church will never grow: we've never done it that way before."

The next thing we do is set unrealistic expectations of our performance. 'I won't be good at it, or it takes a long time to get good at it.'

I am really good at making excuses for why I can't do something. Fifteen people could give me suggestions of things to try to solve a problem, or a new thing to try, and I could find 15 variations on a theme to keep me from trying something. But the only real obstacle is me.

So my encouragement to me is to try something. The Nike saying is "Just Do It.(tm)" I would do well to remember that, and remember all the new things I tried that I didn't think I'd like, and found myself enjoying. Will I be nervous? Yes. Could I fail? Sure. But I could succeed. Nothing ventured, nothing gained.

What a beautiful world

This is a good song for recovery. Sort of helps me with mindfulness, I think. Lyrics are below.

My, my, my it's a beautiful world
i like swimming in the sea
i like to go out beyond the white breakers
where a man can still be free (or a woman if you are one)
i like swimming in the sea


my, my, my it's a beautiful world
i like drinking Irish tea
with a little bit of Lapsang Souchong
i like making my own tea


my, my, my it's a beautiful world
i like driving in my car
roll the top down, sometimes i travel quite far
travel to the ocean and stare up at the stars
i like driving in my car


all around is anger
automatic guns
death in large numbers
and no respect for women or our little ones
i tried talking to Jesus
but he just put me on hold
said he'd been swamped by calls this week
and he could not shake his cold


and still this emptiness persists
perhaps this is as good as it gets
when you've given up the drink
and those nasty cigarettes
now i leave the party early, at least with no regrets
i watch the sun as it comes up, i watch it as it sets
yeah, this is as good as it gets


my, my, my it's a beautiful world
i like sleeping with Marie
she is one sexy girl full of mystery
says she doesn't like me
but she likes my company
for now that's good enough for me


my, my, my it's a beautiful world
i like swimming in the sea
i like to go out beyond the white breakers
where a man can still be free (or a woman if you are one)
i like swimming in the sea

You'll be bright

Some music that gives me hope:

I like this song because it points to hope for the future, and all the things that are out there to explore, but it's not pollyanna-ish. Here are the lyrics:

All the things you'll love,
All the things that may hurt you,
All the things you shouldn't do,
And all the things you want to...
They're calling your name...travel safely.

Every first kiss, every crisis, every heartbreak and every act of kindness...
They're calling your name...travel safely.
Every empire, every monument, every masterpiece and every invention,
They're calling your name...travel safely.

I found stars on the tip of your tongue.
You speak Poltergeist, so do I. So do I.

What comes will come.
What goes will go.
The wind will blow where the wind is blowing.
Let go of where you think you're going.
We'll never know why it flows where it's flowing.

We've always been what we will always be.
I'm so convinced we have to get there, we can part the sea.
So bring the dead to life, turn your blood to wine.
All your life you have waited for this moment to arrive.

And you'll be bright.

Not much to say here, except the lyrics show how life has its ups and downs, but we can get through if we travel safely.

Days Like This

In a chat earlier, people were talking about the phrase "mama told me there'd be days like this." I flashed back to this song by Van Morrison.

Someone asked how this would be a positive song. I think it's positive because Van Morrison is turning the phrase on its head. There will be days when things all seem to fall into place. If today, my day is going badly, and things don't seem to be clicking, or everything just seems to be falling apart around me, my negative thinking sees only these dark clouds and bad times. But the song (and I love the arrangement as well) reminds me that there are days when that won't be the case. See for yourself with the lyrics below.

When it's not always raining there'll be days like this
When there's no one complaining there'll be days like this
When everything falls into place like the flick of a switch
Well my mama told me there'll be days like this

When you don't need to worry there'll be days like this
When no one's in a hurry there'll be days like this
When you don't get betrayed by that old Judas kiss
Oh my mama told me there'll be days like this

When you don't need an answer there'll be days like this
When you don't meet a chancer there'll be days like this
When all the parts of the puzzle start to look like they fit
Then I must remember there'll be days like this
[From: http://www.elyrics.net/read/v/van-morrison-lyrics/days-like-this-lyrics.html]

When everyone is up front and they're not playing tricks
When you don't have no freeloaders out to get their kicks
When it's nobody's business the way that you wanna live
I just have to remember there'll be days like this

When no one steps on my dreams there'll be days like this
When people understand what I mean there'll be days like this
When you ring out the changes of how everything is
Well my mama told me there'll be days like this

Oh my mama told me
There'll be days like this
Oh my mama told me
There'll be days like this
Oh my mama told me
There'll be days like this
Oh my mama told me

Thanksgiving

This is a song I listened to a lot a long time ago, and it has a particular meaning when I'm trying to recover. The lyrics are below the video.

Thanksgiving - Poi Dog Pondering

Somehow I find myself far out of line
 from the ones I had drawn
 Wasn't the best of paths, you could attest to that,
 but I'm keeping on.
 Would our paths cross if every great loss
 had turned out our gain?
 Would our paths cross if the pain it had cost us
 was paid in vain?
 There was no pot of gold, hardly a rainbow
 lighting my way
 But I will be true to the red, black and blues
 that colored those days.
 I owe my soul to each fork in the road,
 each misleading sign.
 'Cause even in solitude, no bitter attitude
 can dissolve my sweetest find
 Thanksgiving for every wrong move that made it right.