How to Un-Fuck Your Life
“So tell me about the past two years of your life,” the therapist on the screen asks me. She’s my third one in the past two years, and it’s not because I didn’t like the others, but location and job switching makes it hard to stay with one long term. They either can’t practice in the state I’m in or they’ve moved onto bigger and better things. That and it’s good to have variety (I’ve had a PTSD/Trauma therapist on standby for many years just in case… comes with the territory of working in Emergency Management).
But I’ve used therapist for post-accident debriefings, to learn how to manage my time better, to work on communication, to coach me on existentialism… you don’t have to have something WRONG with you per say to benefit from it.
Hell, it even inspired me to go to training myself to be part of a Critical Incident Stress Management (CISM) team because I believe so much in the power of talking to someone.
Anyways, back to my original opening sentence, I took a deep breath and repeated the same story I always have, but this time with a slight grin, “well… it started during the pandemic with a viral video I made and a random lady I met on the internet… or but maybe we should start with 2019 when I left my shitty toxic job at Virgin Galactic…”
Ten minutes later, my therapist stared at the screen at me, her eyebrows raised by the “Reader’s Digest” version of my tales of Spaceships and RV living and heartbreak and making school lunches for a random 11 year old and divorce and homelessness and death and the Army and skydiving and moving 1,600 miles away and making my decision to move to Houston based on two cool chicks I met at a bar and finding healthy love again and all of my “Whiplash” of a life.
99% that’s what she looked like
I chuckled to myself after the trauma fire hose I just opened up on this poor woman, “man… what a circus! I sure did some crazy and somewhat stupid shit these past few years…”
“Maybe some self compassion?” she suggested, but I politely waved her off. Truth is I’d been practicing self compassion ever since Spring of 2021. I can be both compassionate for the old me, who didn’t really know any better or had the right boundaries to stop from getting hurt and at THE SAME TIME acknowledge that my decisions were really, really dumb. Hindsight is 20/20 though.
I can laugh at it now, because of how absolutely LUDICROUS the whole thing was, and how grateful I am for the life I have now (my home, my family, my girlfriend, her family, my job, my teammates, my friends… the list goes on).
LUUUUDAAA!
I smile now because it all happened. I’m forever grateful for the experience of it all. I wouldn’t trade the experience for the world, despite it being the most painful thing I’ve ever gone through. It’s funny how I can look back at me when I was house sitting for my brother one March night in 2021, where I was at absolute rock bottom. I wish the current me could just whisper in her ear and tell her “baby girl, just hold on… because the life you’ve dreamed of is coming and the strength you’re going to get from them is going to make you one bad bitch.” But I had to go through that to BE that.
So if you’re reading this from a low spot and a place of healing, I’m telling you, it gets better… and the quickest way for it to get better is to take care of yourself, forgive yourself, and do some serious work. It’s not fun and it’s extremely painful at times. You’ll make a fool out of yourself, you’ll think you got it figured out until something else stirs up, and you’re going to go down a few wrong paths but if you ride it out everything will work out. Trust the process.
*****
Look, who am I to tell you how to unfuck your life? I still spend a bunch of my time writing sad-girl existentialism pieces, now I think I can deliver advise? Hear me out… I used to struggle with Imposter Syndrome until I realized one day that if someone with ADHD can get two masters degrees, become a pilot, lose 110lbs, burn her life down and build it from scratch, start her own business, and be respected in my field of emergency response and management then your ass can do things too. You can pay to listen to David Goggin’s book(s) on audible OR you can get my watered down shit for free. Your choice.
Hey man, I still get self conscious. I still get wrapped up in FOMO and other horseshit. I get tripped up by my past traumas still… I’m a human being too. But I’m here to share with you my lessons learned and my own evolution as I figure life out. Nobody ever figures life out 100%… certainly not at 34ish years old… but maybe we can do this together as part of a collective…
An… Axios… Collective? ;)
Twice with this kid… I’m on a roll…
Back in Spring of 2021, before the “cleansing” as I so affectionally call it, I was suppose to become a certified fitness instructor… but like all the good ideas I have, I never followed through. I am the self proclaimed “Good Idea Fairy.” Every year I see people fail to meet their New Years Resolutions and it makes me want to get back at it again so I can vanquish the snake oil salesmen that prey on these poor folks (FYI the “It Works” wraps don’t work… but I’ll save fitness tips for another blog). It gets under my skin to watch my friends fall flat on their goals, and not in an irritated way but with a little bit of heart break. I want them to win, so some of what I’m going to talk about on here will deal with things that prevent you from meeting these goals you have.
I’ll admit, since moving to Texas though I’ve been enjoying my fair share of Taco Bell and Whiskey too much… so I gotta get back on my grind. I think about when I was my fittest and what I was doing to ensure that. It was during covid when I had nothing to do but run 2-9 miles a day, while listening to David Goggins and tell myself I was going to be an Army Aviator. So I thought to myself, screw it, if I get back to living it I can write about it… and if I write about it I can hold myself accountable for it.
So here’s some of the tenets I’ll be covering in the next subsequent blogs, in between my random bouts of existentialism and adventure pieces:
Comfortable with being Uncomfortable
Life is Not Fair/It’s Not Your Fault but Your Responsibility
Be Your Own F***ing Hero
Being Mentally Fit is the Key to Being Physically Fit
Stop Lying To Yourself
Accept That You’re Going to Die, Allocate Your Time Wisely
Stop Comparing Yourself to Others
Moderation is Key
“Illegitimi Non Carborundum”
Stop Seeking Self Worth from the Internet (yeah I got a blog on here, but I could give two fucks if you read it… I do this for me).
Stop Waiting for An Apology to Move on
The Person You Hate Isn’t Your Enemy, Your Ego Is
Be Self-Compassionate, but Unafraid to Hold Yourself Accountable
Rome Wasn’t Built in a Day, Neither Will Your Resilience and Wanted Habits Be
Your Haters Are Never Doing Better Than You
Don’t Throw Stones From Your High Horse
Hold onto your butts, ladies and gents (and thems… it’s 2023 people)… we diving straight in!
