Hey APW,
So this year has been going by so fast that when I looked on the calendar and saw today was the 26th, I thought it was Memorial Day Weekend and no one had told me. 🤦 In reality, this weekend is my kid’s second birthday. In the past, I’ve agonized over milestones like birthdays to the point of complete inaction (we didn’t celebrate his first birthday until June last year… whoops.). And that’s the reason I’ve spent holidays like Easter and my own birthday (yes, it’s a holiday) feeling kind of grumpy and isolated and not doing anything. So this year, I’m trying something new on for size. I call it… letting things unfold.
With this new approach, I do radical things like not stressing out over whether or not I’ve got something awesome planned, while also being open to the plans that present themselves to me. Even if they aren’t the perfect idea I had in my head. (I know, novel idea, huh?) It requires a level of emotional neutrality that I’m frankly really uncomfortable with, but so far, the results bode well. So, this weekend, what started out as an, “Oh shit, the baby’s birthday is happening in like… four days” has turned into a casual family day with the same friend who was in the room when he was born, with cake and ice cream and a kiddie pool if the weather permits.
So anyway, this is a reminder to myself as much as to anyone else who needs to hear it today, that sometimes the answer to the thing that’s plaguing you right now is to release yourself from the agony for a minute—and see what happens when you don’t hold the future in an anxiety vice grip.
And with that, I have a cake and some balloons to buy. It’s your happy hour, hop on it.
Cheers,
Maddie
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