More than meets the I

Why is it so hard to make the leap between wanting something really badly and putting effort into getting it?

I have always had such difficulty with motivation. The things I'm good at, I've developed the skills for almost accidentally -- often with competition involved. So now I want to be reaaally good at bellydancing. I want to be Ava Fleming good, Aziza good, really top-notch. I do all right now for someone with as little dance training as I have, but I obsessively compare myself with the world's best dancers and come up woefully short. What goes into being a top dancer? A whole lot of freakin' practice, not to mention a healthy dose of weight training. Which is where the buck has decided to stop for me.

Oh, I can easily throw out the excuse that I've been laid up with a bad foot for a few months now, but that can only take me so far, and doesn't explain the other 26.5 years I've had this trouble. I've begun yoga again and even started dancing some, and the foot's just not bad enough to be useful as an excuse anymore. I need to make with the daily practice, the dance-geared yoga, and oh yes, the squats to build up my leg strength so I can do sexy floorwork. And I just can't seem to make myself do it. I'M SO GODDAMN LAZY. If I weren't so lazy I'd be practicing and winning bunches of competitions like Rachel, who is full of capital-D Drive; I'd be fluent in eight languages; I'd still be a virtuoso violinist. Instead, I put effort (not a whole lot, but still too much) into beating Guitar Hero on Expert. What is wrong with me?

I am frustrated at myself. I know I just need to make myself do it -- set a schedule and follow it religiously, hell or high water -- but I've always had so much trouble making myself really put work into things, even if it's something I love. How much of a better violinist could I have been if I had really made myself practice as much as I was supposed to? How much better a bellydancer would I be if I actually worked on it more than once or twice a week? WHY can't I motivate myself for no reason other than the love of the hobby in question?

Squats. Sword. Turns. Arms. Tomorrow. And the next day, and the next. It's gonna happen. I can do this.

Labels: belly dance

Why do we believe people when they say they're okay?

Let me preface this by saying I'm fine. Most everyone I know is fine. To my knowledge, I haven't pissed anyone off too badly recently. Nothing has happened lately that caused this particular thought process other than my usual bizarre mental wanderings. The inside of my head looks like a Family Circus cartoon, I swear.

Today I have been considering how many people lie about their feelings. I would say few folks, other than angsty teenagers who think it's cool to be depressed, lie to say they are sadder than they are; many lie to say things are all right when they're not. When I was younger, dumber, and bitchier I hurt a lot of people; the crime was not only in hurting them in the first place but maybe more so in believing them when they shrugged me off.

A series of vignettes in the style of Chuck Palahniuk:

Flash.

My thirteen-year-old self is trying desperately to look cool at my first concert, the Meat Puppets. I am dressed in oh-so-carefully chosen ripped jeans and a black t-shirt. I am there with my cellist friend, with whom I carpool to orchestra practice on Wednesday nights. This concert is her birthday present from her parents. It is a small venue and we are in the midst of the crowd; some tall boys in front of us turn, see me, feel sorry for my inability to see due to my sincere lack of height, and pull me in front of them so that I am directly in front of the stage. Birthday friend is left behind for most of the concert until finally toward the end I manage to pull her up front too.

"Oh, don't worry about it, it's okay," she says.

Flash.

It is my sophomore year of high school. My close friend has had a crush on Joe* forever. Joe decides to fall for me. "Is it okay with you if I date him?" I thoughtfully ask my friend before embarking on a (brief and somewhat unpleasant) relationship with him. For some reason I believe her when she answers me.

"I want you two to be happy," she says. "Don't worry about it, it's okay."

Flash.

"I want to try sleeping with other people," he said paraphrasedly. "Okay," I said in return. And each time he touched someone else, it broke me a little inside, and yet I said "I'm all right, please, go ahead, ignore me, I'm okay."

Why do we lie? Perhaps it is the fear of confrontation. It is much easier to shrug aside our own pain in order to continue going with the flow than it is to say, point-blank, "you have hurt me, and I am going to feel this hurt for as long as it takes, and no, goddammit, it may be okay later but it is NOT okay now." I used to be terribly guilty of this. Hell, I used to be completely out of touch with pretty much ANYTHING I was feeling other than fleeting senses of gratification.

One of the things I cherish most about my relationship with Vince (and I'm sure I've mentioned this before) is the simple mantra I learned that goes "feel how you feel." Ironically, Vince is the one who came up with this adage and yet does not follow it as often as he should; me, I have completely taken it to heart. It is never healthy to try to talk yourself out of whatever feeling you may be having at the moment. While occasionally you may need to keep it silent (I am thinking here of people who have inappropriate urges to laugh at funerals and such) I think it is always best to admit, if only to yourself, whatever feelings you may have -- guilt, rage, exhilaration -- and let them wash over you as long as they will. I no longer say "I'm okay" when I don't mean it. At best, I stay silent; at worst, someone gets a rare glimpse of a really bitchy side of me. Being honest is important; being honest with yourself is perhaps the most important thing of all.

Am I being terribly preachy? Sorry about that. I just think this is an important concept that often gets ignored. Feel how you feel. It's okay.










*name has been changed to protect those ashamed to have dated him

Labels: feelings