My Locus of Focus

First, if you haven’t read this poem yet, you should go do so! Autobiography in 5 Short Chapters (it’s only a tiny short poem, and will open in a new window when you click on it—are you convinced to click yet?!).

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My mom had a dream the other night that she was me, and it was partly about me getting a suggestion about where is the best place to live in the country. The location, weather, amenities, opportunities, and more were absolutely perfect, but there was just one issue. There was a pot hole on 6th Avenue that would always be really annoying, and could not be fixed. This became a dilemma and a focus in the dream/decision.

As we chatted about this today, we talked about how we’re trained to always focus on the icky things in life that we don’t like…as we are simultaneously (at least verbally) told to look at the bright side of things. It’s so contradictory, but I’m beginning to pull out some interesting threads from this.

I have a messed up knee.

So I do more yoga, more spinning, more elliptical, more walking, but… less running.

My nephew was here this weekend, and we had a great time playing games, playing in the snow, going to dinner and a movie, but…he still made sure to say several times, “I hate school.”

Apply this idea to whatever nags at you—a couple extra pounds, gray hair, short legs, bad weather, a missed workout goal, an old clunky car, a student loan….you get the idea!

I talk to lots and lots of clients and students each week (I think I have 140 students right now!), and it’s a pattern that surfaces all the time:

I love my job, but…

I did eat more vegetables this week, but…

I am excited to go on vacation, but…

I look forward to spinning class, but…

I have great hair, but…

Many times the first part of the statement isn’t even there. People just focus what comes after the “but…”

What if I stopped focusing on what I don’t have, what I didn’t do, how tired I feel, what my to do list is, and just looked at all the awesomeness?!

I ate 3 salads, had 3 green smoothies, went to the gym twice, and went in my sauna once this weekend.

But…I also had a really junky piece of cake even though I’m trying to cut down on sugar, ate more than I wanted for dinner last night, spilled soy sauce on a white shirt, didn’t get any work done because Matthew was here overnight, missed yoga class, meant to clean my car but didn’t, and didn’t go to the grocery store or buy paper for my printer.

If I focus on the “but…” part of this, I feel pretty badly and blah. Doing that is just not productive, and only makes me feel like I don’t want to pep up and take tomorrow by storm 🙂

I think I’m a pretty darn positive person, but I can still pinpoint some ways in which I focus on the muck of life. This week, my goal is to stop myself whenever I’m doing that. I think part of the requirement for that will be to stay in the moment, and there may be some self talk and deep breathing involved. I can handle that!

What do you have going on this week?  Anything that will pull you into the muck of life? If you weren’t going to focus on the mucky stuff, what would you focus on?

Here’s my Excitement List for this week:

Thursday night, my friend Petra and I are doing an Ultimate Smoothie Workshop and we have 40 people signed up. This is pretty exciting, and I know it will be a lot of fun.

I am excited that last week was midterm week in one of my classes, so I have fewer labs to grade this week (and the midterm is scored automatically).

I now work at the college where my mom works, so I get to see her on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday…which is awesome even though it’s only for a few minutes.

I finally tried the Dandy Blend “coffee” and it is so fabulous. I can totally see that becoming part of my daily routine (I like hot drinks in the morning!).

I bought a Clarisonic skin cleansing thingy that I’ve been using since Thursday…and it’s totally awesome!

I get to work from home all day on Tuesday 🙂

There’s more…but I think I’ll keep the rest replaying in my head. I already put myself in a good motivated mood to begin the week, just from this small list.

I hope you have an awesome week too!