Holiday Cleaning

Hello~

Wow! The past few months just flew right by! This week is the first week since late October where I have been able to just sit down and think about what I should do and what I want to do.

After an absolutely hectic semester, I just want to sleep and play games. Catching up on all the lost sleep has been great! Sadly, the second part of my wish probably won’t get fulfilled until after new years.

With the holidays right around the corner, there is so much that needs to be done; mainly gift shopping for family and close friends and figuring out the where & when of every get-together.

Fortunately, I live in a small place that makes it hard to host parties, so everything happens somewhere else. This knowledge and the fact that I have been busy with school meant that I have been very lazy about keeping my place clean.

Why bother to decorate and make things tidy if no one is going to see it? If I can walk around without tripping on cat toys, then everything is fine. 😀

On Tuesday, I had a revelation as I blew my nose for the umpteenth time in the morning. I thought I had a cold, but this stuffy&runny nose has been ongoing since the Thanksgiving holiday. Far too long for it to be a common illness, which means the next logical thing is that my allergies are acting up.

Just as I thought this, one of my cats jumped into my lap and I immediately sneezed multiple times in a row. With my suspicions confirmed, I spent the rest of this week cleaning my home from top to bottom.

Every flat surface and corner was dusted and vacuumed. Every blanket was sent to the washing machine. All fuzzy items were lint-rolled to remove dust. I even spent an entire hour with my swiffer mop working on the tile floors (so many dirty rags……).

As of this morning, I am happy to say that I woke up with a clear nose! There are still some problem areas, but my nose is no longer Rudolph red from near-constant blowing.

To everyone out there, be sure to keep your home clean for your own sake and have a happy holiday season and new year!

A simple task

If you are feeling like you can’t accomplish anything, try doing something really, really tiny.

For me, I chose petting my cats. They are very soft and love belly rubs. It only takes a minute, but adding this task to my daily to-do list makes me feel like I have accomplished something.

This is one of the “easy” tasks I mentioned in last week’s post Feeling Better.

Feeling Better

Hello all!!

After months of feeling listless, I am feeling much, much better!

I was stuck in a very negative cycle. I would be uninterested in completing a task and justify the delay by saying, “I can finish it later.” The next day, I would berate myself for failing to do anything and resigned myself to adding another item to a long list of things that needed to be done.

Many times, I woke up thinking that I was going to get some stuff done. However, as soon as breakfast was finished, I found so many excuses and distractions that stopped me from getting started on anything.

Last week, I finally had a sort of heart-to-heart with someone about how I have been feeling. They reassured me that it was okay; I was human. Even if I wasn’t 100% productive, I had a support network and it will always be there.

After many, many tears, I felt so much lighter and ready to try to increasing my productivity. I grabbed a half-filled notebook and wrote everything that needed to be done; every single task. Flipping to the next page, I wrote five small things that I already do without anything prompting, such as “eat breakfast” and “listen to music.” Under those items, I wrote five tasks that were listed on the previous page.

On Monday, I quickly checked off the “easy” items by noon. While I ate lunch, I had my list next to me. Seeing half of the list already done was a huge motivator. By dinner, I completed three of the five “hard” tasks.

The rest of the week went similarly. My “easy” tasks are mostly done within the first hour of waking up. I was unable to complete all five “hard” in one day, but I just breathed deeply and let it go. Most days, I managed at least one “hard” item, except for Wednesday. That day, I was extremely tired and it was difficult to get all the “easy” ones checked off.

I am writing this post to mark the week I started to put effort into my life again. Hopefully, it will serve as a reminder that it is possible to feel better whenever I get stuck in another depressive loop.

Can’t Predict the Weather

Figures that the first day I wear torn jeans this year is when it is drizzling the entire day. 

Post #101: A Big Change

On November 14, 2017, I had published 100 blog posts. 

Anxiety and Lying

Imagine my surprise when I woke up at 3am two nights in a row after months of blissful sleep. Consistently waking up completely alert in the middle of the night only happens when I feel a lot of anxiety, so of course I began to replay recent thoughts and actions. Today, I identified that it started from me lying about school.

Being more Active

I have a pretty sedentary lifestyle. Besides the occasional ping pong at work and racquetball at the school gym, I spend most of the day sitting. Last week, I noticed my shoulders starting to bend forward. I get messages every day from one source or another stating how posture affects your life in the future, so I knew I had to pay more attention to my body and get those muscles working. 

Forgetting my Computer Glasses

I forgot to bring my Gunnar computer glasses to work a few times this week. This episode of absent-mindedness gave me an opportunity to remember what it was like before having glasses and noticing some very subtle differences between wearing and not wearing them (besides the obvious experience of seeing everything with a yellow tint). 

Deep Breaths

My anxiety is accumulating again. This typically results in less sleep. I am lucky if I get more than 6 hours every night. 

Learning How to Sharpen Knives

I grew up in a household where we use very cheap kitchen knives. The main reason was because they were light. With the exception of my father, everyone else in our family has spider-like arms and hands. Often times, we would spend extra money to buy a product that is lighter, but in the case of knives, we went the cheaper route. My family only has one “high-quality” knife, but it is rarely used because every piece of it is large, thick and heavy.