I’ve become more accepting as to where I am in my life.

More often, I’ve been recalling the quote from Christine Mason Miller. “At any given moment, you have the power to say: this is not how the story is going to end.”

I’ve started playing the harmonica, so I’ve gone from having no idea to being able to play some simple songs.

Digital art.

Where I started:

How is going:

Meditation and it’s changed my life for the better. I control my negative thoughts now.

I used to make a similar sandwich with ham and spinach every day, but recently I’ve been mixing it up and cutting some mozzarella, some pickled peppers, pickles, and a variety of meat and sauce. It’s way better than what I used to do.

I’m learning to drive. After a big pause I felt like I forgot everything completely, but since I started doing lessons regularly again I can see steady improvements

I opened this question and realised with a sense of dread that I don’t think I have an answer to this question; often it feels like my days are slipping by without making meaningful progress in the things I care about.

That may or may not be true, but regardless, I’m going to use this space to improve at self forgiveness. It’s difficult to show myself the compassion I deserve as a human, but it’s easier if I try to think of myself as a dear friend. If I were my friend, I’d feel proud of me for my strength, and angry on my behalf at the fact I am having to endure so much bullshit that is holding me back. I’d feel sad, but hopeful for the hypothetical future where I might be more free to make progress on my goals.

Without a frame of reference, I don’t think this constitutes improvements on anything per se. However, by setting my flag down here and underscoring my intent to be kinder to myself, I am creating a future where I will be able to look back on this comment and think “wow, such progress”. The second best time to plant a tree is now, and all that.

I’ve been getting better at making small but meaningful changes to my life by recognizing that a lot of it is simply habit/routine, making an earnest effort at thinking of ways in which I can modify them, and making an earnest effort at applying them.

Very generally: Think of something I do that I might want to curb, think of why that thing is what I do, think of things I could do that would impede on my ability to do those things, and implement those changes.

Couple specifics:

I’m fond of beer. I don’t binge or anything but if it’s in the fridge I’m probably gonna grab one every couple of hours, and that’s not too healthy and kind of a waste of money, so now, when I buy beer I just toss a couple cans in the fridge and put the rest in the cabinet above the fridge. If I run out I’ll toss a couple in the next day. Now I drink a lot less because I’m not gonna drink warm beer and when I open the fridge I see the scarcity and tend to just shut the fridge and walk away.

I’m an introvert and I love reading about things and events, non-fiction crap, walking around on Wikipedia and stuff. It drives my wife up the wall when I’m doing and I don’t blame her because I’m bad at listening when I’m not giving my full undivided attention, so I removed all my phone chargers except for the one in the bedroom. Now, I just set my alarms and plug in the phone, walk into the other room, get out of that headspace, and engage my wife in conversation.

This july I finally realized that I have no choice but consciously change the ways I think and react to things. There has been plenty of difficult things in my life the last couple of years and after experiencing a burnout (again, I understood afterwards it’s not the first time but hasn’t been this bad before) this summer I had to look myself in the mirror and decide to start making changes, things can’t go on like this anymore, I can’t keep on living like this anymore. It’s sad that it seems often these realizations only come when one hits the bottom in a way or another.

I’ve been to a 3-year therapy and tried meds and so on, I’m sure they “paved the path” but didn’t help me comprehend why I have these troubles that I have and didn’t give me the understanding/empathy towards myself and others that is needed to actually change the thought and reaction models that are problematic, especially anger and shame issues.

Anyways I’ve been looking at videos on youtube about CPTSD and they have helped me a lot. Especially I find Tim Fletcher’s videos useful as he thoroughly looks into the underlying issues and different ways CPTSD shows up in people, just the facts as they are. He’s kind of an old school lecturer type guy, nothing fancy and shiny (needs to be taken with a grain of salt though as he doesn’t seem to have understanding on ADHD/autism and has religious aspects in some of his videos).

Of course being recently diagnosed with ADHD gives more light to why I’m the way I am. But now I’ve been able to start to work on my stuff from a different angle and it seems to take an effect! A difficult and rocky path but I suppose the first steps are the hardest.

Brushing my teeth.

Recently had a root canal and a massive wakeup call of fragile teeth.

It’s been a hard habit to stick with but the wife keeps me accountable.

I’m slowly beginning to understand Japanese enough that I can turn off subtitles and still understand like 25% of what’s being said.

Meanwhile my ability to read it is starting to fall because I haven’t turned the romaji off and I keep finding myself reading that and not the katakana/hiragana/kanji.

I’d say drawing textures.

Understanding computers and networking. I’m so far away from truly understanding it all, but I’m working on studying for the A+ exams so I can get the basics for entry into an IT field. All of this is so interesting to me and I genuinely love learning it!

I worked in marketing, specifically SEO, for the past 9 years. I’m sick of it/Google’s bullshit, and I want to change to a career where I can do some tech work and help people solve problems.

Playing chess.

I learned it in my youth and was fairly good at it back then. Recently I started to play regularly with some friends, and it went quite rusty at first, but I’m catching up now :)

Living on my own and being independent. It’s a kind of constant process. But still.