I'm Actually Much Better These Days

You're not going to believe this: young me would be amazed by how much current me has her shit together. 😂

What Happens When You Let the Cat Out?

Once you let the cat out of the bag, does it chill tf out, or does it wreak havoc? Maybe it depends on the cat. 🤔

Get The Bigger Picture

Reminding myself: when you find yourself ruminating, there's a good chance you're too zoomed in. Mix things up. Climb a mountain. Back away til you can see the bigger picture and reassess. More often than not, you'll see your focus was on the wrong things all along.

Dream: Albert, My Teeth, and Going Down in a Plane with Country Music

The night before last, I woke up from this vivid dream: I was in my actual house with Sean, but it was located in my old hometown, Merced, CA. My mom and siblings lived here, but I'd moved away years prior, and Sean and I were just visiting. Sean and I had our bedroom there in the dream, but one of my sisters had just moved all of my things in it around to doll the room up so she could hijack it and get all sexy for her Twitch stream there. (Not an actual thing btw, so don't go looking for my sister's imaginary, sexy Twitch. 😂) All of a sudden, my teeth started breaking, as they do in dreams. Both Sean and my tooth problem ceased to exist in this dream world a moment later though (as if they'd never existed). 

Merced being a small town, it wasn't too surprising when I went downstairs and saw one of my exes standing in the entryway with two of his friends. Apparently, they were all there to help my mom with a few things. In reality, this ex, whose first night spent with me was my first night ever getting drunk, was one who'd anchored me when I felt lost but who I'd treated terribly, thought of as a sort of crutch, only run to and given the time of day when things went wrong for me elsewhere, and abandoned whenever I was back on my feet. I hadn't changed at all in my dream; I gave the guy a lonnnnnng hug before heading to the kitchen to do the dishes. He came in to help me. Suddenly, the song Tequila by Dan + Shay started playing in the dream and continued to repeat until I woke up. (The song actually didn't strike me as at all relevant to what was going on in the dream. It just randomly happened to come on at this time and stayed on til I woke up.) I started holding my ex's hand. (Nope, I don't have an urge to do this. That ship has long since sailed.)

My family ceased to exist in the dream at this point. Suddenly, my house was a plane and we were in a bad storm. I think my ex ceased to exist then or I just didn't notice one way or another. I rushed to my seat, buckled, and started filming on my phone, as you do. The flight got somewhat bumpy, strong wind pushed the plane backward and eventually down, out of the air and into a large canal in middle of town. The plane started filling with water. I woke up.

No, you may not have the past couple minutes of your life back. 

The song in my dream: Dan + Shay - Tequila

Defensiveness Creates the Enemies You Imagine

Sometimes, the only reason no one likes you is because you go around acting like no one likes you. If you quit being so damn defensive, assuming the world's out to get you and treating everyone accordingly, you just might make some friends.

Fast Fashion's Solution: We Could Just...Not Wear Clothes

I just read an article on the tremendous impact of fast fashion on countries such as Ghana:

'Dead White Man's Clothes': The dirty secret behind the world’s fashion addiction

The title is an eyebrow raiser. My main hang-up here, however, is the fact that this issue exists despite the fact that the majority of clothing people wear is for vanity and societal expectations or out of habit — not for physical comfort or health. We don't even *need* to wear clothes much of the time, yet we buy and discard it at breakneck speed. 🙄

Workouts: Less Effort For More Gains (Written For Dance Gamers)

I just read another article stressing the importance of not doing every workout at max effort:

Most of Your Workouts Should Be Easy. Here's Why

I've been making some progress with this recently, but it's still mildly disheartening to walk away from any single workout without some noticeable improvement over my last effort. Writing that out, I realize how ridiculous it sounds, but I also know it's a pretty common sentiment, particularly for those specializing in an activity measurable in as much detail as the dance games we play. Still, I'm finding ways to appease and compromise with my desire to see regular achievement:

-Phrasing the day's goals to myself as things to attempt, rather than things to complete. Goals that would work here on your dance game of choice include trying to time well on 5 songs, spending 20 minutes attempting songs 10 bpm faster than you're comfortable with, or just playing a particular selection of charts you've been wanting to try and seeing how you do on them. Ticking these off the list sometimes feels just as satisfying as getting a new pass/score improvement/PR.

-Going in with several contingency plans for when it turns out I'm not up to achieving my primary goal for the day. For you, this might mean being ready to bust out the list of 5 songs to try timing well on if it turns out you really don't have the energy to attempt the speedy songs you meant to.

-Setting goals that account for and complement where I'm at in the moment (such as taking into account my cycle, fatigue from recent workouts, etc.). If I'm due an active recovery day, my goal might be to tackle that easy marathon chart that I've been kinda interested in playing but that normally doesn't quite seem worth the time.

^Just a quick brain dump, but perhaps there's something of value for someone in there.