Summer of Facing Fears: Dealing with Change, Saying No, and Loving Yourself

I've been a bit behind on updating this so I figured I'd pop in here to say hello and see how everyone is doing.

I myself have had a solid summer so far. I've been booked out pretty regularly on the weekends with this and that (family stuff, weddings, birthday, or just general nonsense). All in all, it's been pretty decent and I've been digging the warm weather.

I don't know about you guys but I'm not a huge fan of change. At least not emotionally. Logically I understand that it's 100% necessary for growth personally, spiritually, and emotionally.

But that doesn't make me any less of a baby who fights it with a big lump in her throat the entire way. :-p  So if that's you, don't feel bad-- you aren't alone.

I'm very much a creature of habit and routine. When I'm in a groove, I'm in it for the long haul. Whether it's full competition mode with my work/diet/training schedule or it's my off season, I'm am very much an animal who is all in, or all out.

Change in general just throws me off too much, so you can imagine how goofy in the head I get when something big/unexpected happens. I fall into whatever routine I'm in and then all of the sudden I feel trapped and like a prisoner in my own little world, but I'm lost without them. I am both comforted and trapped by this existence. It takes me a little while to figure out my next move and where I'm going, and it tends to leave me reeling and a tad "down" emotionally until the next stepping stone presents itself.

I've been feeling restless for a few months. Undisciplined, weary, and a bit like I lost my identity to a certain degree. I've been trying to figure out the cause and it's taken me a bit to put my finger on the root.

One issue is that I've been receiving a lot of advice (unsolicited and solicited) from people who care about me and mean well. The problem is I absorb these criticisms and suggestions about how I live my life, who I talk to/when, the decisions I make, etc like a sponge. I take everyone's opinions into consideration and give it a valid run against my own gut checks and who I am at my core. I'm open to growth as a person but I end up fighting an internal skirmish of who I truly am against what people expect of me. This 24-hour-a-day internal confliction leaves me disoriented in general and is one of the fastest routes to sending me in emotional disarray. My interactions with people are always honest and sincere. You'll always know I'm telling you the truth, even if that means that I'm bearing my heart on my sleeve and I have running shoes on. I have to draw my boundaries and realize people's opinions are just that- opinions. Not guidelines. And that's okay!

Another issue I've realize is I sort of feel like a woman without a true home. I've been living in my friends' house since September but it's never really felt like home. Not that they aren't fun, but I'm just renting out a room. Nothing is mine. Nothing in the living room, kitchen, etc is mine and I always just sort of feel like an uncomfortable hotel guest. You can't really change the decor or replace knick-knacks, you can't replace furniture or make big changes to make something feel like it's yours. Ultimately I'm just renting out a place to put my bed, but I'm grateful they gave me a place to go in a terrible time of need last fall. I've been searching for some semblance of normalcy in my life and it's just not quite there.

I have been looking for my own place for a long time and nothing was in my price range. Truly, I have been terrified most of the summer that I wouldn't get to find my own place and feel like I have a home again. Rents are astronomical in this economy and luckily, I happened to reconnect with an old friend who was looking to move to the same part of town I wanted to live in. So we partnered up and began hunting.

So the big news for me is I will be moving into a new place that's truly "mine" at the beginning of next month. That's good. :)  Woo! It's entertaining to me because this will be the 3rd place I've lived since the end of last September (me and my ex's place, current home, new place in a month.) My goodness, if there's anything I've learned in the last 5-6 years, it's how to move and in a hurry!

One of the things that I'm still working on a problem that I've had my entire life. I have a tough time saying "no" to people. I hate disappointing or hurting other people's feelings more than anything in the world. I overextend myself and my schedule in order to accommodate other people's needs pretty regularly. Sometimes I'm just tired. I don't know why I'm so afraid that the other people will think I'm a total jerk if I just say "Dude I'm too tired, I can't", but my heart just won't let me do it.

I overextend myself with workinging in some capacity, with obligations after work, and on the weekends trying to help everyone else out. There is such a thing as being "too accommodating" when you're realizing you're slacking on your own goals, rest, and money situation in order to be everywhere at once. One of the big skills I'm trying to learn is saying "no" by the end of the summer without worrying about needing an explanation. Sometimes I just need time to myself and that's that.

Worse, however, is a deeper issue with not saying "no" and putting my foot down with certain things and bad behaviors. I have a long history of people pushing me around emotionally/mentally by having stronger personalities. I'm am naturally an easygoing, docile, contemplative person. I'm not a fighter unless provoked or backed into a corner. I'm not a total pushover but it takes a lot for me to be blunt or get feisty. The main area this is truly causing an issue in is in my dating life.

There are a lot of bad guys out there. There many guys who were make plans with you and flake. WAY TOO MANY.  There are guys out there who will make the plans with you, flake on said plans, and then wonder why you're not very eager to reschedule. I get promises of phone calls and a 4 day disappearance with no explanation. Really? Additionally, there are a lot of guys who try to force you into a relationship before you're ready. You can draw your boundaries 100 times and they still challenge them or question them without truly paying attention.  There are plenty of guys who I swear will just sit on Facebook and wait for me to log on to send me an IM. (Sorry guys but if I don't know you in real life, the chances I'll want to hang out with you in real life or go on a date are next to none. It's just a safety thing with me, the internet is bogged down with creeps.)

Maybe I should rephrase all of this: there are some good guys with great potential but aren't quite there yet in terms of manners and prioritizing.

Straight up: I have met some nice guys but I have been subject to some AWFUL men in the last year. I'm not kidding. And you know what? I'm learning to just remove these people from my life. No really, I literally delete them online and take their numbers out of my phone. I don't have time for it. You treat me like crap, you lose access to my life. I'm worth so much more than chasing after these people who can't so much as show up for their own plans they made.

The irony in it all is the highest quality guy I've met is from here... but doesn't live here anymore. This initially frustrated me but he has given me some hope in humanity and that maybe there are some decent guys out there who validate my feelings, call me back when they say they will, give me a valid heads up if they're going to be busy, and make the time in their busy schedules to make the effort to communicate with/see me. This guy has raised the bar hellaciously high and along with it, healed some wounds from being battered and bruised so heavily in the last year. I'm just grateful for the positive lessons and soothing effect his presence has brought to my life at this point, even if that's all it ever becomes. He's also brought my willingness to tolerate with the slightest BS from guys to 0% because he never pulls any stunts. How refreshing!

God has a way of taking care of us and teaching us lessons in His own time and way. Often in an order that seems jumbled, random, and bordering on directionless to our mortal eyes. This year has fostered many tears, many adjustments, and many evenings quietly brooding alone. People have filtered into my life and then almost immediately back out. I have made some life-long friends. I've seen some people for who they truly are instantly, or by slowly chipped away at their true selves in time.

Through all of this, I have found a strange empowerment.

I love who I am.

I don't care if you don't like the choices I make. I don't care if you don't like my purple makeup or that I like wearing my glitter running shoes to the bar or at work. I don't care that I wear black almost every day. I'm a loving, selfless, awesome person. I have been bruised, battered, betrayed, judged, and I still get up and can smile. I'm resilient and I treat people well. People who come into my life and leave weren't meant to be in it. I can't take it personally if they choose to go. It's okay for me to say no to people sometimes, it's okay that I've made a million mistakes and I will continue to do so. It's not okay for people to treat me poorly and the best asset I have is my personality, above and beyond anything else.

It's so simple, yet hilariously complicated.

Summer is nearly gone. This summer I have dealt with Lake Calhoun, pushed through my phobia of not being able to find a place, went to the bank like a big girl to start repairing my credit, and I'm learning to stand up for myself a little more. Not world-changing feats in most peoples' eyes but they're definitely changing my world one day at a time.

Hope you're out there figuring out your own hang-ups, too.

Thank you for reading. <3
Abby