NOT GONNA MAKE A BETTER ME

People who know me well know I generally make some sort of "intention" for the New Year -- a way in which I want to grow and/or change.  

For example, in 2010 I decided to "public" my interests:  I started leading "Ecstatic Dance", a meditative movement group.  I also started a community group for older women for support and dispelling ageist assumptions.  Sometime after that I started performing my spoken word poetry at open mics and contributing to a Chap Book with other women poets.  All lasted for several years.  In 2012, I started to blog --  ongoing now for 10 years and counting.  In 2019  I took yoga teacher training and now I'm  teaching.  One year I decided to "watch more football" and "watch more TV" without apology!  The intention doesn't have to be only one thing nor does it have to be a big "self-improvement plan" along the lines of the usual "lose weight", "go to the Y", "read the Classics" sort of stuff that feels like a chore and is always short-lived.

This year, as I mentioned a couple of posts ago, I thought at the age of 72  I'd make an intention of being alone more; traveling alone; challenging my "alone" comfort zone.  I thought it would help me feel less resentful about Hub's many solo trips.  I've changed my mind.  I might do that if I want to, but if I don't, I'm not gonna force myself to do something I'm only trying to do in relationship to someone else's pursuits and choices. 

Instead, I'm looking back.  Since November 2016 it's been one damn thing after another. In my personal life came shake-ups in relationships and break-ups with institutions and groups that I didn't see coming.  Then there was Covid, which NONE of us saw coming.  All provided ample fodder for catapulting me into a mental health crisis and ongoing wheel spinning.  And of course, the Presidential election of 2016 and its aftermath of chaos, the Big Lie of 2020, and the Insurrection of 2021 all created a shit-show of a political situation that completely pulled the rug from under my most basic beliefs about our country and the people in it, so I was called to near constant high alert emergency activism.  I'm tired.  What I need is to sit down and be quiet.  I need to read some novels.  I need to laugh a lot more.  I need to feel OK more of the time.  I need to challenge myself to nurture myself, not stress myself.

Now my over-arching intentions are to: Not fix me. Not fix the world.  I'm being guided by Radical Acceptance of the reality of the present moment.  It is what it is.  I don't have to like it; I do have to accept it.  Also I'm moving to a place of Radical Acceptance of ME and my basic nature -- no more trying to be a good "fit" for people in a way that makes them more comfortable and me less so.  

Does this mean I won't still be introspective and shift and change with new insights? Does this mean I won't contact another legislator or ever go to another march?  Nope. I will do all of that, but in the coming year I will do it with more ease and less anguish and in a way that puts me first. (Whew, that's even hard to write -- lots of self-judgment about prioritizing myself!)  I will do it with clear-eyed realism.  And I will do it all without attachment to a particular outcome -- which is hard but I think doable with practice.

In the grand scheme I have little to zero power to influence or change anyone or anything beyond myself.  I'll just skip along being me, as I am, in every present moment.  

NEW YEAR INTENTIONS 2023

Not gonna make a better me.

Not gonna save the world.

At least, that's the view from here...©

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