Self-awareness, Rain, and Being Comfortable With Idleness - 9/3/26

Hi again. I tried to make my blog posts look nice but I forgot everything I knew about html so bear with me...I think it would be nice to have some longer blog posts about things I like talking about, like enneagram or other personality stuff but as of right now I'll probably stick to just talking about whatever's on my mind. I thought weekly entries would be a good idea, but it's been a week and there's nothing new I think is really worth talking about. Lots of little things, but the ideas haven't snowballed into fully formed thoughts & opinions yet.

Really I've just been remembering things I haven't thought about in a long time. It feels weird to have enough time and energy to focus so much on myself. I've forgotten about the kinds of things I like to do, or more like I just haven't been thinking about that stuff at all. I want to make art again but it's been so long. I'm kind of worried I'll get frustrated that I'm not as good as I used to be. I've also been thinking about emotions...I've been trying to spend more time being aware of what I'm feeling and why instead of just acting/reacting without thinking. I think just taking a bit to think about what I'm feeling is really helping - instead of catastrophising over things that seem impossible to even begin dealing with, I can simplify things into a matter of 'What am I feeling right now?' and then, 'How can I make myself feel better?' Of course it doesn't magically fix everything but it really has been helping me get out of my own head.

It's that time of year when it starts to rain again. I used to love rain as a kid but now I hate everything about it. Everything feels damp and cold and gross and you can't go outside without getting wet unless you carry around an umbrella. And then when you get to where you need to be you have to hold this soaking wet umbrella in your hands the entire time you're there. And I can't dry my clothes because I don't have a dryer and my lawn is so long but I can't mow it. Because of the rain. And there's maggots in my bin outside that I'm going to have to deal with after it stops raining but I really really don't want to. I'm happy though, because it feels like I finally have time to do things I like doing instead of just trying to get through the week. 

Something I really want to focus on doing this year is fixing my attention span & actually thinking about things deeply again. I think last year I was really focused on 'doing' more than 'thinking', which was what I needed at the time, but now I think what I need is to work on sitting with my boredom and being comfortable with being idle. I've gotten so used to rejecting anything that doesn't serve an immediate purpose to me, and I think in doing that I've lost the ability to be patient or sit with my thoughts. It's gotten to a point where it's hard for me to even sit through a full movie without some kind of buffer or distraction. I want to get to a point where I'm able to do things that bore me or don't immediately satisfy me without anything to 'help me get through it'. Life is happening all the time, and I don't want to miss out on any of it. But it's hard to actually follow through on something like that. I delete all of my social media and then redownload it every few weeks. I have no idea how to stop using my phone so much without throwing it into a river. Let me know if you have any ideas.

That's all I really have to say right now.