Jo's conundrum

I've been thinking a lot about, well, me. Odd I know. I have a good life. Paradoxical but good. At first glance it's chaotic, messy, restrictive, and sometimes eclipsed by frustration, stress and an unpredictable future. A longer look reveals a lot of happy moments, great conversations, freedom, laughter and love that binds us closer than we've ever been. There is so much that I want to be and do, and yet it feels like there's so much that I'm doing without anything really happening. I don't want to belittle my family. The question is, how do I make sense out of it all?

Bear with me, I'm not sure what I'm exactly trying to say but hopefully this post will enlighten us all without boring anyone too much.

I have pretty much the same routine everyday. It's not one I planned, or even one that I like, but it seems to be the one I always fall into no matter what. I wake up and then I take care of Ethan. If I make time for something else it's cleaning. Luckily, I'll get to spend an hour or two with Derek before we get ready for bed, and then I wait for it to start all over again. If I do get some time to myself I usually take a nap, balance the 'business' part of our lives or end up daydreaming about our future home because I'm too tired to do anything else. I sat down last night and thought about this past year: what my goals were, what's happened, what I've accomplished. I have all these ideas for doing things but they never get done and it's so disheartening. I had to cry when I realized that through an entire year I can't think of one goal I've reached or accomplished. Even when I think I'm making progress with one of them I end up back a square one. I don't want to be depressing, bear with me a little longer.

Now, I can hear the voices in my head start to make excuses for me (it's funny, they usually sound like those whom I love most). Excuses like: you've had a really stressful year (or 5 really stressful years); you've had a huge lifestyle change; you've moved to another state; Ethan's almost two and he's learning and changing so much, of course you're not going to have time to do much; you've been sick for almost three months now no wonder you're not doing much. I've been kindly given these excuses by myself as well as others, but I'm not satisfied with them. As soon as one starts to echo through my head my rational, heartless brain steps in to reason it away until I have no more wiggle room. I've gotten really good advice about how to balance my life and I'm trying to apply those parts that I think will help but I seem to get lost somehow and end up back with the same old routine.


This mass of confusion is my present state, and has been for a very long time. I'm tired of it and I've decided to get rid of it. Now, while I'm still working on implementing a new schedule for myself this is what I'm going to do right now:

Stop. Take a deep breath. Say a sincere prayer. Listen for a moment. Go and do something worth doing.

I guess from here it's just one step at a time.