Stop the World, I Want to Get Off

I am so done. Everywhere I turn I see stuff I'm in the middle of! I know it's all leading somewhere good, but I have to learn how to set limits.

I feel that I barely get time to rest before it's time to start up again. I miss my husband!! I haven't socialized with my friends in a while. My weekends are booked, my evenings are booked, my days are full, and I am pooped.

Everything in my agenda is something I want to do. My husband thinks I do a lot, meanwhile I look at my living room and see the mess I didn't clean up. Yet. And it's 1am.

I am really curious about how to change my attitude here. I can see that it's bad for me. Trying to do too much at once is such a pitfall for me. Sure, it's all good, fun, interesting stuff. But too much means I don't get to relax into each thing, because I have to work on whatever it is right now so that it's done in time. Too much means I don't get enough sleep, and that I feel stressed when I'm awake.

But how can I say no to a good thing? I seem to have no sense of time. All of you who have waited for me know that already!! But I mean a sense of time in a more transcendental sense. I can't set a priority, because I seem to see everything as happening all once. As though life is not a series of events, but a herd of buffalo stampeding over me. I see no cycles, no growth, only sudden and unexpected happenings.

Well, now that I write that, I realize I am starting to slowly see some cycles and some growth, but mostly I feel that I experience life all at once. It's really very tiring.

Help!

Thrilled! Just Thrilled!

Do I ever have some fantastic news!!

I have been offered a gig at my gym leading the Senioren Fit (obvious translation probably, but it's the Senior's Fitness) Monday mornings!

I'm a real personal trainer... with a JOB!

I still lack in confidence - but I'm like that. Until I am awesome at something, I think I suck. But my boss thinks I can do a great job, the seniors love me (awww) and I can improve my sports-Dutch as well as my ability to lead a group of really fun people. None of them are good followers, but they try and seem to like a little bit of change and challenge, so they'll keep me hopping!

There is also talk of another hour or two, as-needed, to work with individual clients on their own fitness programs.

I'm so pleased with myself and how my life is going. There are so many struggles I have every day, over small things such as laundry or what to have for dinner, but the big picture... man, is that ever a beautiful sight!

And I am learning about what really matters. I can be such a perfectionist, and I can lose sleep about things that might go wrong... or I can make another choice. I can see what a great life I have, how full it is with wonderful friends and family, and how it keeps getting better and better!!

So. Tired. Mind. and. Body.

I have been so tired the last few days. And by tired, I mean fatigue that gets in the way of life. A little bit of tired, well, we're all used to that from time to time. Extra tired, a day or two is doable with a few hours catch-up sleep. But I'm talking the kind of tired that makes it hard to socialize because I've lost my train of thought, and I don't get jokes because my mind just isn't going fast enough to catch them! The kind of tired where I sit down with a cup of a tea and wake up when it's gone cold. And worse, the kind of tired that makes me crave sugar, caffeine, bread and fatty foods. Because those foods always help a person feel full of the 3Vs.

(You know, vim, vigor, and vitality. The 3Vs. Get it??)

But, I'm doing my best to drink lots of water, limit the foods that come to mind, and stick to foods that I know are good for my mind and body. Let me tell ya, it ain't easy!

I get like this from time to time. It does seem to happen around the time my period is due. And just for fun, some nausea-inducing rides on the emotional PMS roller-coaster get tossed in. It also seems to happen when I've pushed myself too hard.

Lately, I have been pushing myself a bit. Not too hard, or at least, so I thought. But I had to cancel plans with a friend this week because I needed to rest, so obviously I had put too much on my plate.

I find it so difficult to balance how I feel now and how I'll feel later when looking at my agenda. Sigh.

Self-Doubt Attacks!

I am surprised to find myself lacking in confidence and conviction. It is very uncomfortable!

I am now a personal trainer. I have been interested and active and informed about fitness and fitness-related areas in a more-than-average fashion for many years (with a 2-year hiatus due to a car accident and a nasty fibro flareup). I am very fit and very strong.

Yet I can't seem to meet my own fitness goals.

Well... that's not entirely true. I set a goal of running a 10K race, and met that after 3 months of training. I discovered along the way that I don't enjoy running much. But, if I ever needed to run at a fairly slow pace for an hour or longer - say, escaping a vicious, geriatric killer, or a zombie, I could. Both categories of potential attackers are notoriously slow. As am I.

I also set a goal of returning to my pre-accident/illness flexibility, strength, and weight. I've done that. Which is quite a huge accomplishment, and one I tend to dismiss because it took a little bit of work... every single day. A bit like brushing my teeth. I do it every day, and while I enjoy compliments on my great teeth and smile, I don't feel particularly proud to still have teeth. But back in the day, when people didn't know about teeth-brushing, lots of them had no teeth left by my ripe old age of 37. So, while my amazing progress is wonderful, it's also no surprise.

So what am I feeling so discouraged and self-doubting about? Well, it seems I still have a high percentage of body-fat. This doesn't make sense to me scientifically, as I:

1. am reasonably careful about my diet (far more than most people, but I don't completely exclude treats or meals out).
2. have lifted weights consistently over the past two years with the purpose of increasing muscle fibres and muscle density. This is not only to give my body a shape I like, but muscle needs more calories to sustain even just sitting around, so more muscle = more calories burned just doing nothing.
3. am an active person, participating in aerobics classes, cycling all over town to run errands, and other kinds of aerobic training.

I just don't get it. And I think I should, given my knowledge and experience. So... bring on the self-doubt.

Actually, bring on consulting someone I trust to know better. I don't have to have all the answers, I just have to care enough to find someone who has the answers I need. For now.

Microcosm of My Life

This week was really exciting, but also a bit overwhelming. I've set aside the first half of 2o11 to focus on myself... really focus on myself. It feels quite weird, from time to time, but my goal is get to know myself and to give myself a good foundation for the rest of my life.

For my inner happiness I am exploring interests such as personal training, learning French, and socializing more. I'm also working with a life coach, which I've written about here and here, to learn how to love myself unconditionally.

For my physical happiness I am working with a physiotherapist to get limiting pain under management so I can freely pursue my fitness goals. I'm seeing a massage therapist regularly to help with pain management, relaxation and recovery. (I don't think I've mentioned it before, but I have fibromyalgia and chronic fatigue syndromes. I am currently relatively asymptomatic, and I'm working on keeping it that way!) I'm also back lifting weights a couple of times per week, after trying to focus on aerobic activity for a few weeks and finding that it's still not my cup of tea! I've also started working with a Cesar-therapeut.

What the heck is a Cesar-therapeut? That's what I asked when my massage therapist mentioned it. Therapeut means therapist in Dutch, but that didn't really clarify anything for me. So I googled it. Ummmm. Yeah.

Bravely, based much more on my massage therapist's suggestion than on any understanding of what might happen, I made an appointment. I had my first visit last week. I have never heard of any practitioner in Canada doing anything similar, so I just have to describe it. Basically, a Cesar-therapeut works with people to improve how they move. They work with all age groups in lots of different ways.

After getting me to strip to my undergarments and submit myself to her steely gaze from all angles, my therapeut looked up from her clipboard and said, "Well, you stick your butt out, so then your belly sticks out to compensate, and then you hold your upper-back too far back to compensate, and then you have to round your shoulders forward to compensate for that." I'd been wondering why I've lost a lot of body fat but still had a sticky-out belly!!

In about 5 minutes she had me doing a couple of exercises to correct all of that, that I'm supposed to keep doing on my own. I found it very interesting because the point of the therapy is to get my body moving more naturally - rather than still moving the way I did when I was compensating for intense, constant pain during a two-year-long fibro flareup. And for me to do that on my own, rather than ongoing visits. She wants me to not have to come back at all!

Another new thing that happened this week was an invitation from my boss' business partner to set up a marketing planning sesssion for our gym with the key players at work. This came out of a bunch of marketing ideas I described for them, just for kicks, a few months back. They thought I knew what I was talking about and I'm now exploring a third role at my job! Receptionist, personal trainer, marketing dynamo!

I also ran 5 billion errands, counselled my husband who was really in quite a funk for a few days, worked crazy shifts and had a meltdown about feeling so full of enthusiam and ideas and so stuck on what to do next! Also about my work schedule for next month, but that I resolved by telling the colleague who does up the shift schedule what my limitations are going to be from now on. Assertiveness is my middle name. Ha!

So yes, my life is in a state of limbo, and it drives me nuts. I like to KNOW everything. I don't like plans changing, I don't like the unexpected, I don't like the unknown. But, on the other hand, I am absolutely sure that I am on a great path, that I have a great partner, and that no matter what the future holds, I will be happy anyways!

Wanna Get Fit?

Wanna get fit? Just call me! I earned my Personal Trainer Certificate with a score of 92% on the exam. I still have lots to learn, and I hope I always feel that way! It's so exciting to know that I have a solid base, and have lots of options for my own growth while guiding others to reach their own goals!

For my own development as a trainer, I currently have four goals.

1. Find the beginning, and start there.
   
2. Keep it simple.
   
3. Keep it short.
   
4. Keep it fun.

Each client has their own starting point. If I were to get a job working in a gym similar to where I work now, most clients are not very informed or interested in fitness. Most clients come to the gym for their health, for their appearance, or for fun with their friends. In contrast, I go to the gym because I really enjoy how proud I feel lifting increasingly heavy weights, or testing my limits with interval training.

So what I have to keep in mind is that a potential client will fall anywhere along the myriad continua of fit-unfit, informed-uninformed, experienced-inexperienced, and enjoyment of working out. What they all have in common is an interest in getting or staying fit.

I am developing a fairly standard set of questions that cover what I need to know about my client before developing a plan. I need to know about their health, their eating habits and activity level, what activities they enjoy, and their goals. I also need to know what they 'know' about fitness. Oftentimes people don't realize that information has changed, or that they've misunderstood something. Not every question needs to be asked, some would only come up if the client asked about it.

It's important to start with the basics.

• Why is the client here?
  
• What do they already do in support of their goal?
  
• What is the thinking behind what they're doing?
  
• Is it getting them what they want?
  
• What are their limitations?

Some friends have volunteered to be guinea pigs, and hopefully a few more will be taking the plunge! It doesn't matter too much for now whether they are Dutch or English speaking. I can't wait to see what I can learn from them!

Getting My Life Coached

Wow! Let me just say I was really excited after my first 'official' session with Marloes (see here for the first part of the story). We talked about a number of things, but what really stood out was an exercise with cards! Not playing cards, exactly, but this set of cards.

I found the English image on the right online, but I could only find information about this game in Dutch (left).

To understand how the 'game' works, this website explains it really well. Basically, Marloes asked me to go through all the cards with positive traits, and pick out a couple that I felt really described me. Of course, I have all sorts of positive traits, but the one I chose as a particular feature of mine was CARING. We talked a bit how I enjoy being a caring person. We also talked about how sometimes being caring actually causes me problems. I enjoy doing things for people, but sometimes, somehow, it can also feel like an obligation. And from time to time, I feel taken advantage of, and think that some people just use me for the nice things I do to make their life easier. So we talked about how too much of a good thing can lead to something not-so-good.

The next step was to choose a a negative quality from the set of cards with negative traits to describe what I feel happens when my caring nature gets out of hand. I chose SUBSERVIENT. The word in Dutch is wegcijferen, which means to make into a nonentity. It is perhaps best translated in this context as sweeping myself away. I got pretty mad when I realized that's how I felt. Even though others have definitely behaved badly towards me, and shame on them, the real issue in my life is that I have sometimes done that to myself. Lately I have valued pleasing others, caring for them, and doing what I can to make their lives easier, far too much. I sometimes go to extremes, and disregard my own needs, wants, interests, preferences, etc. in favour of someone else's. And that's not only no fun at all in the short term, it hinders me from being happy later on as well.

The next step was to look at the positive traits again, and choose one that represented an opposite to the too-much-of-a-good-thing negative quality. For this one, I chose INDEPENDENCE. I'm not sure if anyone else can understand the logic of my mind (or of anyone's at all!), but I chose 'independence' because someone who does whatever she wants, takes care of herself, and puts herself first, well... that person is not subservient at all, and never diminishes herself for another. We talked about this for a bit. I was surprised to find that I found independence a bit scary. I had the idea that if I put myself first, then I wouldn't be kind or loving anymore. And since I really value being caring, that bothered me.

I'm not sure quite what happened, but all of a sudden I realized that there is no risk of me ever being anything less than a wonderfully loving, kind, and caring person. I'm still a bit surprised that independence is something I'm not attracted to, but I think I associate independence with being alone. And although I like to be alone more than a lot of people, I sure don't want to live my life alone. (Hence, my loving nature lol!!)

The final, and most difficult step, was to choose the quality that I see as being too much independence. I chose SELFISHNESS. I find this quality somewhat challenging to define. I would say that someone who is selfish is someone who has no objective values to live by. For example, a selfish person has no problem telling a lie to avoid a confrontation or to manipulate someone else's view of them. A selfish person is intolerant of others if the views, feelings, or needs of others are inconvenient. I really dislike that kind of person, and I guess I fear being independent a bit because I see a slipperly slope. I get a bit nervous that maybe being independent will turn me into someone manipulative, intolerant and self-serving. And for me, there'd be nothing worse!

Now, wasn't that an interesting journey of self-discovery!!

What can a Life Coach do for me?

A few weeks ago I had my intake appointment with Marloes Elbrink, Life Coach with Stekker Coaching. That's her on the right. She was a bit younger than I expected, dressed fashionably and casually, as seems the norm here in Holland. She greeted me, showed me to our meeting room, and offered me a beverage. Then she got down to business.

She invited me to talk about why I was looking for help at all. I told her about how stressful the last few months had been, and that I knew something needed to change, but I didn't know what. I explained that I had been to talk-therapy in the past, and although extremely useful intellectually, I wanted something more practical. I noticed right away that her style of interacting with me was very different than what I had experienced with talk-therapy.

As I told her about some of the things that had happened, I felt myself re-living the events, and of course there were tears, anger, hurt and frustration. In talk-therapy, that had been a place to sit and dwell a while. Not so with Marloes! No, instead she would sum up what I had said, and then ask leading questions. I found this very helpful for two reasons. First, I don't actually enjoy feeling angry or hurt so I was glad to move on. And secondly, she 'validated' my feelings and at the same time, invited (expected) me to use my creativity and intelligence to move on. I guess I wasn't feeling too able to do that on my own.

Once we had chatted for a while, and we both thought that she knew enough about me and understood what was bothering me, she gave me an assignment. It was a toughie!! I was given a set of pencil crayons, shown to a large easel, and asked to draw a tree that I felt represented me in my life now.

I didn't feel at all that the assignment was silly, but I did struggle to even begin. A lot of thoughts swirled in my head, from how to make a 'perfect' representation to where to begin and why. Finally I drew something like this:


Then we talked about my tree. I explained that this was actually a tree to be very proud of. After all, look how much it has achieved! It is nice and tall, with lots of beautiful green leaves. And it grew even without any roots at all, and kept growing and achieving lots of things, which is why it is so tall. But all those achievements up in the air, lacking good support from the roots up to the achievements makes my tree vulnerable to the wind or other external events. So then I drew my 'ideal' tree:

As you can see, this is a totally awesome tree. It has a great root system, a nice strong trunk, and can easily support all of its beautiful leaves. If a storm came by, this tree would do just fine.

I was really surprised at how touching and meaningful I found this exercise. As a result, I have made a commitment to myself to focus on re-building a strong foundation for myself. I am putting what I need to build my base as my first priority in all things.

Does My Life Need a Coach?

I am generally a happy person. I laugh and smile and joke and tease a lot. Even during the happiest days of my life, there are always down moments, but they were generally short-lived. So, I was unpleasantly surprised when I found myself not happy for several months. From about August until just after Christmas, I was sad, angry, frustrated, and impatient.

Why I felt that way was situational, as I've mentioned in previous blogs. Basically, two women I had thought were tried-and-true, friends-for-life grew into people I didn't like anymore. I felt confused and disappointed that they were no longer who I expected them to be. I've also changed as well, and now I don't put up with conduct that I feel is dishonourable, selfish or unkind. So that meant, for these two women, that I had to stop all contact.

But it seemed to really trigger something in me. Those women have genuinely changed, and who they are now is disappointing, with values and conduct that I find weak and vain. Yet, although I found this whole experience distasteful, I was surprised that I found it so upsetting. That's why I felt it was a trigger of some sort. After all, I have 'lost' friends before, but it was never so bitter or unpleasant. It wasn't fun, but it wasn't so... painful.

People come and go in our lives, and people change. I expect that. I don't always like it, but I expect it. So for these two to change, and make their noisy exit, well, it's sad in some ways, but it's also an expected part of life. So what was so upsetting for me??

I couldn't figure it out. Part of it is definitely that I felt taken advantage of, that my kindness and generosity was accepted, but not my friendship. A little bit like in my dating days, if I was out with a new fella and knew it was not going to progress beyond dinner... I always paid for myself. I just never thought it was fair to let a man pay my way if I was just getting a free dinner out of it. If it was part of the getting-to-know-each-other process, part of developing a relationship, or part of an ongoing relationship, sure. But if I realized I was in it only for the meal, I would never let someone pay for dinner when I can pay for myself. So in a way, I guess I feel that I was that poor guy, thinking he's in a relationship and paying for his girl, when the girl is thinking, you better be paying, sucker, and I'm ordering five courses!

And the more I thought about that, the more I realized that I have become more and more someone who is caring towards others, but less and less someone that puts myself first. I love to be caring. I love to help people if I can. I don't want to lose that. But man, I gotta put myself first. I want to learn how to see my own needs more clearly, and to go out and take care of them.

So my MIL suggested I check into a workshop on self-confidence. I asked for a bit more help, and she sent me a couple of links that she found and told me what to search for. (Keep in mind I live in Holland, and even though I am officially fluent in Dutch there are a lot of specific words or phrases or expressions that I don't know. So knowing what to look for was pretty handy!) I checked a couple out, most were quite expensive or inconvenient to get to. I emailed a couple with a few questions.

Later that day, Marloes Elbrink from Stekker Coaching called me in response to my email. I was on my way out so we made an appointment to speak the next day. The next afternoon, she asked me some pretty specific questions to find out what it was I was looking for. She told me that Stekker Coaching wasn't offering any workshops for a couple of months, but she thought that working with a Life Coach might be effective. She invited me to an intake-appointment to see if Life Coaching might have meaning for me.

I decided to take her up on her offer. I'll tell you all about it later!

Step Up or Step Down

I was just giving some thought (and tears) to how disappointed I am to find out that some of the friends I thought were true have recently become, or shown themselves to be, fair-weather. And I was feeling very sorry for myself indeed. But then... my amazing and creative mind took me in a new direction, and I thought of the friends that I really hadn't expected much from but who have stepped up to offer me a little extra in my time of need.

Now I didn't expect much from these people for a number of reasons. Some I have always had a nice feeling for, but had never deepened the friendship particularly. Some I haven't seen in years. Some I don't keep in regular contact with. And some I just thought of as 'lighter' people, more casual... but who clearly have surprising depths, at least surprising to me.

It is too bad that my judgement of some is so off. I've been rudely disappointed to find out that people I loved through-and-through have turned out to be untrustworthy, or unreliable, or just plain selfish. But what I now realize is most interesting are the people that I saw as more peripheral to my life, who have taken this opportunity to make a difference and offer me kindness. I wonder what other wonderful things I will see if I focus on the pleasant surprises instead of the unpleasant ones.

I wonder if I can keep my focus.