Fighting to BE in the Moment

swimming pool (Photo credit: freefotouk)

So my new (two years now!) apartment has a swimming pool. And the weather is finally warm enough for me to get into it on a regular basis.

So why can't I just swim and enjoy it?

I find I am having a lot of trouble, these days, to keep the pool simply as an activity of fun and/or relaxation, rather than turning it into a chore.

Swimming is good exercise, we all know that, and I need to get in more exercise. So I am swimming laps, and I enjoy swimming laps, but I am trying not to let that become a chore. To have it become, "You must swim XX many laps."

I am trying to enjoy the texture and temperature of the cool water as my arms and legs move (ungracefully, but nobody's watching) through the water, the feel of it flowing through and around my fingers and toes, the faint smell of chlorine, the the shimmer of the water, the warmth of the sun on my face and back.

And that's another thing. The pool isn't heated, and like many apartments in SoCal, it's in an unnatural canyon. Between the shadow of the buildings on the east, and the ones on the west, the pool only gets direct sunlight for perhaps 5-6 hours each day, even in July, and the temps can drop as much as 30 degrees at night. So the water temperature tends to stay cool, even on days when the temperature reaches the 80's or 90's.

This means, since I am not a fan of the cold, I like to lie out long enough to get heated up, before getting into the water.  (Yes, I always use sunscreen. No, not always all over - later on I generally find a spot or three that I managed to miss.)

I lie out, get warm, or hot even, get in the pool and swim some laps till I am tired and/or cold, then repeat.

Can I simply lie in the sun, enjoy the rays sinking into my body with their vitamin D, slowly turning my skin from its natural corpselike white color to a faintly tan color?

No, I feel I have to do something, even when I am lying out. The other day I took pages with me for a speech I am rehearsing. Generally I take a book. Because otherwise how can I justify slicing out 1 1/2 to 3 hours, in the middle of a perfectly good day, when I could be writing/organizing/houseworking or Doing Something Productive?

Yeah, do ya think maybe I should learn something from these posts on workaholics? Yes, I have many Important Events coming up, that demand research and preparation.

And yet, it is still okay to set aside time for pure relaxation. Not just okay, but necessary. To kick back and tell that monkey mind just to hush.

I'm going to try to get in the pool a few evenings a week, plus at least one day this coming weekend,  when I will just BE poolside, and in the water.  Just to enjoy the water, and the sun, and the palm trees rustling in the wind.

I may take a book, if I am reading one that I enjoy, or I may not.

What do you do to beat back the "productive" vibe?

Your thoughts?

How the Buddha Girl Got Cracked

As I was decorating my new apartment last year, I saw a photo of this small Buddha woman/girl in one of my many catalogs and fell in love with her. (FYI, I was once the catalog queen of the West Coast, though I have cut down substantially) She radiated peace, tranquility, compassion. I decided I must have her, that she would help me keep focused on being Zen, letting go, breathing.

Eventually, as things settled down, I decided she belonged in my bathroom. Bought a couple of white floating shelves - but she didn't look good on a white shelf. Bought a dark shelf, and gave the white ones to a friend.

She looked awesome.

But... she's fairly substantial, weighing about four pounds. And I live in SoCal. Earthquake country.

So of course, the next project was finding museum wax to secure her on the shelf, in case of earthquake, so she wouldn't come flying off the shelf and brain me in the head as I was seated on my white porcelain meditating spot. Should said earthquake occur while I was *ahem* Taking Care of Business.

Done. Now, here's where the fleas come in. *scratching*   I could have put a single daub of museum wax on the bottom center, and she would probably have been just fine. But, being accustomed to OCPD-think, I decided to place three daubs of museum wax under her, one at each corner, and really press her down on the shelf, hard. Better overdoing than doing just enough, right?

Photo via mksystem at Flickr
Fleas, or just a good healthy scratch?

Buddha Girl was fine for one night, then she cracked.

At first I was really distraught.  Thought about throwing her away, and getting a new, uncracked one.  or perhaps using wood stain (or my cheap and easy go-to, colored markers) to minimize the appearance of said crack.

Then I realized, Buddha Girl is even better now.  She's my reminder that overdoing doesn't always work out for the best.  A reminder to check for fleas.  A reminder that sometimes flawed and cracked is better than perfect.

Now I look at her (several times a day, depending on my water consumption) and smile.

She's cracked and flawed.  I'm cracked and flawed.

And we're both perfect, just the way we are.

Do you have a talisman, picture, or some reminder 
that being flawed is perfectly okay?

Your thoughts?

Are ANTS Spoiling Your Picnic?

At a picnic, an ant or two... no big deal.  A swarm of ants, and we're ready to call in the Marines.

ANTS is also an acronym for Automatic Negative Thoughts, as described by Dr. Daniel Amen in his NY Times bestselling book, Change Your Brain, Change Your Life.

Here's some typical ANTS (from Dr. Amen's book, but ones I also heard, myself, my my OCPD ex):

• You never listen to me.
• You don't like me.
• This situation is not going to work out.  I know something bad will happen.
• I should have done much better.  I'm a failure.
• You're late because you don't care.
• It's your fault.

Dr. Amen suggests we realize that thoughts actually impact how we feel and behave. 

• You have a thought.
• Your brain releases chemicals.
• A electrical transmission goes across your brain.
• You become aware of what you're thinking.

Notice how negative thoughts affect your body, he suggests.  

Every time you have an angry thought, an unkind thought, or a cranky thought, your body releases chemicals that make your body feel bad (and activate your deep limbic system.)  Think about the last time your were mad.  How did your body feel?  When most people are angry, their muscles become tense, their hearts beat faster, their hands start to sweat, and they may even begin to feel a little dizzy.  Your body reacts to every negative thought you have.

As adults, surely we've all noticed that when we do have an ant infestation in our home, even if we wipe up and kill every  ant, when new ants come in, they almost always follow the trail left by the other ants.  So, too, ANTS that travel across our brains leave a trail.

The key to "getting over it" begins with awareness.  Being aware we are choosing to think these thoughts - perhaps we are traveling a path that's seen ANTS scurry across it a thousand times.  Breaking the pattern isn't easy, but it's imperative for those who have OCPD to stop letting the ANTS rule.

He offers several steps to becoming an ANTeater and focusing on the positive thoughts - the ones that makes us feel good, to retrain our brains.

For those who love and live with someone with OCPD - constant negativity can be contagious, and we often have some exterminating of our own ANTS to do.

 He doesn't suggest, either, that it is realistic to only think happy thoughts, but if we were to count, how many of our thoughts would be positive, how many neutral, how many negative?  A pattern of mostly negative thoughts is going to drag us down, if it hasn't already.

There are some people I know who are not very "big" on Dr. Amen.  What I found fascinating is the photos of brain scans - those of normal people, and those with abnormal behaviors.  In a sense, it really IS in their head.  Sometimes terrible, anti-social behavior can be the result of a stroke, cyst, or other abnormality, and requires surgical intervention.

He makes the comparison to computers - if the hardware of a computer is broken or malfunctioning, it's not going to be able to run new programs.  No matter how many times you reload it or reboot the machine.  While I haven't finished the book yet, these ideas make much sense to me, and I like that he isn't pointing to one magic bullet, but to a combination of ways to address this:

• Rule out (or diagnose) any abnormalities in the brain itself.
• Correct said abnormalities with medication and/or surgery if necessary.
• Psychotherapy and behavior modification (CBT) as needed.
• Consider nutrition; adjust and balance the diet.
• Regular physical contact - get hugs and touches from family members, bond through love-making, massage.  Human beings are meant to touch and be touched.
• Aromatherapy (the limbic center of the brain is directly connected to the send of smell).
• Implement regular physical exercise.
• Work to improve positive thinking patterns, and kill the ANTS.

To me, the worst part of Automatic Negative Thoughts isn't even the negative, but the automatic.  Much like a smoker who always reaches for a cigarette when he is on the phone, doing something in a knee-jerk kind of way, without thinking about it, without being aware, is where the trouble can come in.

The people who have had most success in controlling OCPD, and for those without it, in creating a more joyful and peaceful life, are those who've learned to be mindful.

Have you read this book?  What did you like (or hate) about it?

Has this started any new ideas marching across your brain?

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Too Perfect Tuesdays: Chapter One Continued

This post continues with more from Chapter One.

This series will look at a small snippet of The book on the Perfectionist Personality, aka The Obsessive Compulsive disordered Personality, aka OCPD, each week.  Please follow along, leave your comments, engage more on the FaceBook website... whatever your heart calls you to do.

Too Perfect, When Being in Control Gets Out of Control by Allan E. Mallinger, M.D. and Jeanette DeWyze was published by Random House in 1992.



Chapter One
The Obsessive Personality  (continued) 

If there is a single quality that characterizes obsessive people it is a powerful, unconscious need to feel in control - of themselves, of others, and of life's risks.  One of the primary ways in which this needs manifests itself is perfectionism.  A whole family of personality traits is rooted in these two needs - to be in control and to be "perfect."  These include:

• a fear of making errors
• a fear of making a wrong decision or choice
• a strong devotion to work
• a need for order or firmly established routine
• frugality
• a need to know and follow the rules
• emotional guardedness
• a tendency to be stubborn or oppositional
• a heightened sensitivity to being pressured or controlled by others
• an inclination to worry, ruminate, or doubt
• a need to be above criticism - moral, professional, or personal
• cautiousness
• a chronic inner pressure to use every minute productively

By my definition, someone is obsessive if his or her personality is predominantly colored by traits from this family - in any combination.  Many of these traits, when they aren't exaggerated or rigid, are valuable qualities.  It's hard to imagine someone succeeding in our society today without some degree of self-discipline, for example, or some desire to work hard and avoid errors.  But some people are "too perfect."  The obsessive traits in their personality are so dominant and inflexible that these virtues actually cause a host of problems.

<snip> I see how unaware most obsessives are that they're harming themselves; they recoil from any hint that their heavy burdens could be self-imposed.  Most have grown up believing that you can never be too careful, hardworking, thorough, prepared or organized.  In fact, they're often proudest of the very traits that cause them the most harm.

The book goes on to tell stories about people coming to see the doctor for physical symptoms, or because a partner insisted they get help, not because the Perfectionists recognized any problem with their lifestyle or attitudes.  It tells about Laura, who took on a crushing workload, refused to delegate tasks, and felt she had to be all things to all people.  About Raymond, a workaholic surgeon who wouldn't open up about his own feelings, bullied his wife and passed judgment on everything from her cooking to her political opinions, and then was heartbroken when she embarked on an affair because she felt lonely and unloved.

***

I can relate to Raymond's wife.  When my ex b-f would cry, I would reach out my arms to hold him, and he would either barely tolerate it, or shrug me off.  When I would have a bad day or bad dream, he would never spontaneously hold me or ask me to talk it out.  Sometimes when I specifically asked for it, he would hold me or let me talk about some feelings; other times even when I asked he'd turn me down, or give me a short, wooden hug.  It's very hard not to take that kind of emotional rejection personally.



from Andrew Petro - Creative Commons

 Everyone I've met on chat boards can tell a story about a couch/car/bed that took years to purchase, because the Perfectionist had to get the right one.  No matter how old, broken, uncomfortable or the old one was.  (2+ years for our couch.)  About frugality beyond making sense, about traumatic scenes because a routine may have been interrupted.  The horror! 

And the rules, the rules, the rules!  Almost everyone has a story of the Crazy Rules. 

Demand-Resistance and demand sensitivity - there will be more on that to follow, but even a perceived demand may meet with an automatic no.  (For example, many partners resent doing something for Valentines' Day, because they feel it's expected of them by society, whether or not their partner has asked for special treatment, and then exhibit resentment to their partners for the implied "demand.")  There's a lot of withholding of feelings that goes on, of not feeling trusted or supported.

Checking for fleas again:  I'm frugal, for the most part (I do use every fragment of paper on my steno pads!) but will not, as many Perfectionists do, eat dicey leftovers to save a few dollars.  The potential cost of getting sick and missing work, of having to go to the doctor or emergency room, to my way of thinking, outweighs the pain of throwing away fifty cents worth of food that might still be good.

I do tend to reflexively take the devil's advocate position, which is certainly an oppositional trait.  Hmmm.  I believe in following rules when they make sense, but don't believe any rules are always right.  One should obey the speed limit, for example, but what if you've got somebody in your car in dire straits and you're rushing her to the hospital?  I do feel that pressure to be productive all the time, but I also make myself take down time, and I'm learning not to feel quite so guilty about it.

What your flea count?  Do you have a furniture purchase from hell story?

Tell me about it in the comments.