Ow

I'm sore from tip to toe.

One thing that is very ironic is that usually I can't focus on anything.  Pain doesn't go away for things like ADD though.  It yanks your attention right back to - ow - hold on, it's calling my name.

The impact was on the driver's side of the vehicle, and the side airbags deployed.  I have a colorful bruise on my left arm and I can feel a swathe along the left side of my back that is probably doing a rainbow impression, too.  I haven't looked at it yet.  Yes Jenn, I will go in and get checked out.

Have I mentioned how happy I am that we're doing #NaBloPoMo this year instead of #NaNoWriMo?  I don't think I could create any fiction at all this year.  Maybe next year I'll just write a daily journal.  The last three Novembers have been far more twisty and turny than any fiction I've ever read.

Now if you'll please excuse me, I'm going to go conduct some research on the effectiveness of Ibuprofen, Aspirin and their relatives Tylenol and Aleve. One at a time, of course.

Surfing Sandbar Style

I'd much rather be at the Sandbar.

Smashing Pumpkins

I've been grumbling lately about how my cell phone always runs out of juice part way through the day and how all my stuff is in storage and I need a winter coat and how I don't know anyone here. My car isn't getting the mileage I expected when I bought it, none of my shoes are comfortable enough to walk the 1/2 mile to work every day, grumble grumble grumble. It wasn't a full on pity party, but I had definitely started hanging the decorations.

< * C R A S H * >

On the way home from my son's school we were hit by another car. My side airbags deployed. My son called out "I'm ok"

< * The Dust Settles *>

I noticed powder in the air and on the dash from the airbags. I called 911, I got out to check on the other car. It was freezing outside, so I pulled my new coat out of the shopping bag. Yeah, that's right. Less than an hour before I had bought a knee length 100% wool coat with a delicious collar that curved up around my ears. My dad recently sent a care package with a pair of wool lined leather gloves and I pulled them out of the glove compartment where they'd been waiting for the really cold weather to hit. I was warm and cozy as we walked up and down looking at the cars and calling our insurance agents and in general wishing we were anywhere else but there.

< *Waiting * >

And then we waited. And waited. and waited some more. I was thankful that I was wearing a comfy pair of shoes that I miraculously found this morning in one of the boxes crowding our temporary apartment. Modest heels, rubber soled. Just the thing for standing on the shoulder of a busy road.

My insurance agent emailed me a copy of the car's proof of insurance. My phone somehow managed to work perfectly as the police officer pulled the relevant information off the PDF.

My phone went dead. Turned out that my son had his cell phone on him. All of the gentle reminders about putting it on the charger every night and taking it with him every morning had been heeded. It was fully charged and I was able to make a seamless transition with my insurance agent, my dad, my son's friends.

Apparently I've got people: my agent arranged for a body shop to stay open late so that I could have the car taken straight there. Arrangements were made for a local car rental place to pick me up at the body shop and put me in a rental car. I was turning down offers from my son's friends to come and pick us up.

< * What was I so unhappy about again? * >

In just a few short hours I realized that things weren't as bad as I thought they were. There's always something to grumble about, but there was also a ton of stuff to be grateful for. Here's my short list for today:

• God's watching out for me!  
• My loved ones and I are alive and have no broken bones
• I got my coat, gloves, and comfy shoes right as I needed them.
• My phone stayed alive for the important part, and then a replacement phone was close at hand
• I'm not alone. Everywhere I turned tonight people were kind and helpful, even going out of their way to take care of us. 

And the car mileage? Well, if it turns out that the car is totalled, I may be getting a second chance at a car with great mileage. I hope it isn't totalled though. There's something to be said for being able to call my car a smashing pumpkin.

Smashed Pumpkin

So much to be thankful for today

I was in a car accident today, and this is a placeholder post 'til I get back from walking my oh so patient dog.  Suffice it to say that I have found so very much to be thankful for, and once I get back from the dog walk I'll share some of my reasons why.

Distractions

I've been trying to post during my lunch hour, but today somebody popped open the "Alarm Will Sound" door on my floor.  Did I mention I'm highly distractable?  Consider this a placeholder.  I'll post later some of the "Why's" of living with ADD

Where am I?

Have you ever been completely mentally “away?” Not just daydreaming, but mentally fully immersed in a completely different situation? This happens to me a lot. My understanding is that this is why what my brain does is called Attention Deficit Disorder . It’s not that I can’t maintain focus, it’s that I have a disorder that makes it difficult for me to switch between a deep focus when intermittent focus is needed or switch out of intermittent mode when I need to be focusing deeply on something, like you know, my next blog post.
Something that has helped me understand this brain mechanism better is meditation. Apparently there are two basic kinds of meditation – I’m going to call them the orange and nitrogen because I have no idea what they’re really called.

The Orange:

In this form of meditation you take a single item, like an orange or a raisin or an action (your breath) and you focus everything on that. You consider the folds and the valleys and the color and the stem and every single thing related to that orange. You train your mind to exclude all other stimuli so that you can deeply concentrate on the scent and the weight and the texture of that orange. Just like a muddy stream settling after a storm, gradually all the sediment in your mind settles and you’re completely clear. It’s amazingly powerful and I’ve finished this kind of a meditation feeling as though I’ve awaken from the deepest most refreshing sleep.

Nitrogen:

In this form of meditation you focus on everything in and around you. It helps me to think of nitrogen – it’s everywhere in our environment, and as a gas it gets into our bloodstream and our lungs and fills every space that we move in. When meditating like this you keep yourself grounded in the here and now, becoming deeply aware of all of your thoughts and your feelings and all the sights and sounds around you. I have deep trouble doing this. For whatever reason I start out focusing on the mundane activities of life around me and the next thing I know my mind is a million miles away. I pull it back and bring my focus back to the spaces that nitrogen has crept into and I’m gone again, thinking about how I need to add fertilizer to my plants. My personal theory is that I’m already uncommonly aware of the things around me, and as such this kind of meditation doesn’t help my brain settle.

So what’s my point?

Anchors help me. As I write this I have a printed sheet of paper across the room with my top three priorities on it. As my mind wanders off my gaze lights on my priority list and it narrows my focus back onto my priorities. At home I’ve taken a slightly different tack: rather than have a priority list tacked to the wall, I remove the distractions. The TV set is tucked into a back room and I keep the computers closed up unless I specifically need them for a task. My phone ringer and calendar reminders are on, but text message notifications are off. I know where my mind goes, and I’m learning how to direct it where I want it to go.

Today’s Question: Who am I Not?

I’ve worked with a lot of people in various stages of life. One of the techniques that I’ve seen help some people figure out what direction to go in is to first eliminate the options they don’t like. Horribly paraphrasing Sherlock Holmes, once you have eliminated the unwanted, whatever remains, no matter how improbable, is the direction you should take.

I know I’m easily distracted from the boring task at hand by the promise of a hilarious tweet or another news story or yummm chocolate. The Buddhists call this state of mind “Monkey Mind” meaning unsettled; restless; capricious; whimsical; fanciful; inconstant; confused; indecisive; uncontrollable". Ok. Um, this is not who I want to be.

So, taking Sherlock Holmes advice, who do I want to be? I want to be consistent and responsible. I want my decisions to be reasoned and thought out and made in a timely manner. I want to be dependable and clearheaded. Those of you who know me in real life may say “But this is who you are” If so, Hooray! But I do want to mention how much effort it takes me to be like this.

• I write everything down or text/email it to myself. Very simply, if it isn’t recorded, I don’t consider it “known”
• I schedule everything. If you look at my calendar, you’ll see a lot of 1 minute appointments for random things.
• My “appointments” have multiple reminders
• I work with my strengths – For example, I know that I like being around people. Rather than try to do things that I’m bad at by myself, I schedule them with people, or in conjunction with things I like to do.
• I realize that some things are going to take me a lot more time to do and I’ve learned to accept that.
• I apologize a lot. Unfortunately, even with all the tips and tricks I use, I still say things in the heat of the moment that I probably shouldn’t say, forget things I’ve promised to do, and miss events. Still, a humble heart is supposed to be good for you, and I figure all of the oops’es have definitely made me more humble.

This article is what inspired today's blog post, even though I didn't really stay on topic. Still, it’s worth a read because basically this is what I try to do – outsmart my baser self by setting up “tricks” that keep me productive.

“Capable psychonauts who think about thinking, about states of mind, about set and setting, can get things done not because they have more will power, more drive, but because they know productivity is a game of cat and mouse versus a childish primal human predilection for pleasure and novelty which can never be excised from the soul. Your effort is better spent outsmarting yourself than making empty promises through plugging dates into a calendar or setting deadlines for push ups.” Thanks David McRaney for the quote that I've been thinking about all day.

National Blog Posting Month

I tried to do NaNoWriMo'09, which ended in a major crash and burn when our life was turned upside down and shaken, not stirred.  I simply didn't have it in me to create new stuff when real life was demanding every ounce of creativity I had.  I WANT to write, and I love the community of NaNoWriMo, life just got in the way.

Somehow November showed up on my doorstep again.  I'm still trying to figure out how that happened, but one thing I do know:  I want to write.  I need to write.  When I write I feel better in my skin.  I just don't want to commit myself to 50K words.  Debbi suggested I try NaBloPoMo instead, so here I am (and Jenn insisted that I capitalize it NaBloPoMo)

The other reason I'm trying for NaBloPoMo is that I'm not sure what direction to take Phera's Focus, and I'm hoping a month of writing and interacting will help me figure this out.

Questions I'm going to try to answer:

• Who am I?  <-- this one's a hard one for me!  You know those bio snippets on every social media site?  I hate'em.  
• What do I value?
• What inspires me?
• What do I fear?
• What do I desire most?
• What are my talents, interests, and strengths?
• Where will I be 15 years from now?

Will you explore these questions with me?  Thanks! I need the encouragement :)