What I've Learned

It’s been a while since I’ve shared what I’ve learned with the world. The past two years have been filled with a lot of trials and tribulations, so my personal sharing has been limited. Yet I feel that it is time for me to get back to basics and share the lessons I am learning during this time of intense personal reflection.

What I’ve Learned

1. I can’t make everyone happy.

I have always tried to be everything to everyone. That has meant sacrificing myself, time with my family, my general health, and well-being. It has also meant ignoring intensely personal creative projects that I’ve pushed to the wayside in order to focus on others. My personal philosophy has always been that of the Buddha and to keep feet firmly planted in the present and enjoy the experiences happening in the right now. Instead, I found myself running back and forth with no focus and direction.

Living that way is not easy. Quite frankly, it’s exhausting. And while I may sound incredibly selfish, I have had to say “no more.” I will not bend to suit the moods of others. Their moods are theirs to own, not mine to manage.

2. I can only be me.

I don’t want to discuss how often I have changed who am I am to make others happy. Typing that makes it real. Not only real but also a bitter, tough pill to swallow. I’ll be quite honest with you, I’m disappointed in myself.

But, it’s more than that. Like every other woman in this country, I’m angry, I’m triggered, and I am exhausted. And I refuse to bow to the whims of others and change because they deem it so. I have been in therapy for two years to deal with my inner self/critic.

My inner critic is an asshole who feeds into my feelings of isolation and encourages me to avoid others and remain in a cycle of perpetual loneliness.

I turned against myself, my own social nature, listening to my inner critic who told me I had to do things a certain way and be a certain thing for everyone. My isolation was the perfect breeding place for negative, self-critical thoughts.

The more self-critical I was, the more isolated I became. Which led to my dropping out of everything I loved, including this space, for the majority of the past 5 years.

I can only be me, as I am now. I’m not the same Lisa, but a new version. I don’t even know what that version looks like, but here I am.

3. I need quiet.

Even though I realize I am quite a social person, I need quiet. A lot of quiet. People would say that I’m a “highly sensitive person” and there may be some of that, but that is not for this place.

I like quiet. I don’t like the noise of social media hammering away at me 24/7. My work is in social media/communications at a high level in the nonprofit world, so I get the irony of this whole statement. But I’m pretty sure this is how I realized how essential quiet is for me. When you’re so fully connected and on call 24 hours a day, digital burnout comes at you hard and fast.

Finding quiet keeps me sane.

4. I like feeling strong. 

I am pretty sure I’ve spent my entire life worrying about what other people think about me on the outside. There are countless hours wasted in front of a mirror worrying about my exterior appearance and how that somehow makes my self-worth better, or be more acceptable to society at large.

At this point in my life, I just do not care what other people think about my outside. I am more concerned about my body being strong and fit. Yes, I am fat, but thanks to PCOS and other hormonal issues I am never going to be what others deem is acceptable. I’m much happier knowing I can go to the gym and bust out my time on the treadmill, or truly sink into my poses during yoga class. I feel alive when I am sweating and moving. Truly alive. It is a beautiful thing.

There is so much more to share, so many more lessons learned. But for now, this is my stopping point. Be well, friends.

This should be What I’ve Learned Week 3,000 or something. Instead, it’s a new edition on a topic that I have woefully neglected for quite some time. There are days, weeks, months, that you lose what you hold dearest to you. Mine are my words. I’m very thankful to my girlfriends who have supported me, who believe in me, and my words, and let me know that one day soon, they will be back.

As I dip my toes into the icy cold water, I thought I’d come here and write what I’ve learned over the past two months. I won’t be able to share everything, but I will let you know what’s really resonated with me and what is still resonating with me right this very minute.

What I’ve Learned

1. You can care too much. If I do something, I give it my all. I don’t stop and work until I am an exhausted mess. Caring is a good thing, but taking it to an extreme creates risk for severe burnout. Need an example? I threw out my water resistant phone cover so I wouldn’t take it into the shower anymore to make sure I was always on top of things. Hence my absence everywhere from my own burnout.

2. People who care will call you out on your BS. You know who are you. Thank you from the bottom of my soul.

3. Filling the well isn’t a metaphor. Your body is a well composed of the beautiful things that you put into it. Letting it run empty, and not taking the time to refill it, like I have, has ramifications. You sit, staring out a window, and you’re numb. There is no joy in the little things. I’m refilling my well a little bit everyday.

4. Vacations are essential. Vacations help fill your well and allow you time to breathe. I don’t care if you sit in your house and binge-watch Netflix, or travel the world. Take time to disconnect and just breathe.

5. Do something you enjoy. If you’re like me and have forgotten what you enjoy doing, make a list just for you of those things you used to do and see if you get a spark. I made my list and for some of them, there is no love lost. The others, I realize, I missed immensely. Find those things and make time to do them. While I understand you can’t do them every single day, don’t let a week pass where you haven’t done the thing you love.

That’s it for now. Those are the things I’ve learned and it’s only the tip of the iceberg. There’s more, but they are dark, deep and raw, so I have to keep those to myself for now. Thanks for still being here, friends.

This week’s What I’ve Learned is shorter than normal, but there are lessons I need to share that aren’t ready. I could share them, but I would feel like I’m cheating you, but more importantly, I’d be cheating myself. I’m a few days late sharing my weekly thoughts on life and the lessons I’ve learned, but there has been a lot to think about over the past week or so. Even now, I don’t know if I have learned all of the lessons I’m supposed to with what I’ll be sharing, but I’m open to embracing all they have to share.

1. Find good doctors. I left my OB/Gyn that was much closer to home to go back to my old one — nearly an hour drive on some days due to traffic. He’s an expert for women as they start to age. After a discussion with my health and what my body was doing, he told me “the old doctor didn’t give you bad advice, that’s what I’d tell you to do and here’s why.” In two minutes, he explained why some of the things he wanted to do for me (and the old doctor) was necessary and the positive effect it would have on my body.

Two minutes.

That’s all it took for explanation and for me to understand. Doctors are pushed to their limits and with medicine being a corporate game of earnings and billable time, it makes it extremely difficult for them to do the thing they went to medical school for: patient care. It’s so essential and two minutes over one year ago could have saved me a lot of physical misery. That’s why I’ll never complain if my doctor is late or tied up with patients. I know they are giving them the time they need – their two minutes.

2. You can’t always be a rockstar friend. As I’ve mentioned before, the older I get, the smaller my circle of friends has gotten. Oh, it looks like I have a ton of friends everywhere, but those that I can truly count on — I don’t need that many fingers to add the numbers up. Friendship isn’t a numbers game. It’s about people.

I have always been a rockstar friend. Always. Until I couldn’t be.

I just couldn’t do it. The people who love me and stuck my me let me be, but always checked in. They know my anxiety and depression issues — I have a tendency to shut the world out and ignore it and everyone one surrounding me. They won’t let me shut them out and hide — giving me space when I need it, and pulling me back into the world when I’ve been absent for far too long.

3. Be a grateful learner. I’m in a new work role, supporting the team behind Let’s Win PC, a pancreatic cancer non-profit.

I’m very grateful for this opportunity to work with Let’s Win. While my skills behind the scenes are an asset, I’m learning so much every single day about this new world. When you hear of pancreatic cancer, the first thing you think of is death, but I get to see the beauty in the lives of the patients, their caregivers, and the doctors fighting this horrible disease. I get the honor of learning from them about life. They’re teaching me lessons that allow me to have much deeper personal growth  — to develop as a human being and as a working professional. For those reasons, and many more, I am eternally grateful.

As I’ve thought about the lessons I learned while being sick for nearly two weeks, I have wondered how it will affect my family and friendships. If I were pregnant, you’d say I’m in a nesting phase. Even though I’m not pregnant, I still believe I’m nesting, minus the manic burst of energy.

So what have I learned?

1. Never watch the Sherlock episode “Hound of the Baskervilles” while running a high fever. This one episode freaked me out on a normal day, but this time it caused me to dream at a different level of WOAH than normal.

2. I’ll never miss a flu shot again. I know that a flu shot does not prevent the flu. I also know that it doesn’t always work and that creating it is a guessing game. But if it helps decrease my chances of getting the flu, or lessens the severity, sign me up.

I am not a whiny person by nature and prefer the stiff upper lip line of thinking. You know, the “stay calm and carry on” jazz. That’s me. Let me rephrase, that’s me in my 40’s. But the flu made me whiny compared to my normal behavior. My friend Anne, who so selflessly took care of me while we were in Ohio and I was so sick, took me to task for apologizing for being whiny. I’m pretty sure I was acting like a toddler, while she tried to reassure me I wasn’t whiny.

Maybe she will weigh-in in the comments.

3. I have some great friends. My inner circle continues to grow smaller and change, but I find that I am relived that it does. Of course, some of the ones that are on the outside of the circle I never thought would be there, but that is their own choosing.

4. I can write. My own impostor syndrome prevents me from writing here as much as I’d like and it sucks. That being said, I’m working on something that gratifies, yet frustrates me, and has truly shown I am capable of great narrative description and conceptualizing a scene.

5. I have to stop being afraid. Much of my life has been spent living in fear of putting myself out there. In fact, this should be a post all of its own. I’m not afraid to dive deeper on this topic, but I still need time to reconcile with the issues my anxiety causes — which is the fear of so much. I think we all have some type of fear that stops us cold in our tracks and it’s different for everyone. I also know that I’m not alone, which makes things much easier. That being said, it is easier when I tell myself I am not alone and I have to remember to keep it up.