Getting ready to meet a friend I haven’t seen in nearly a year for a socially distanced walk, I prepare to answer the inevitable question: How are you doing?
Two articles this week really spoke to me and my general state – languishing and YOLO. The latter has defined my ever-increasing contemplation of late, imagining a very different life pursuing long held dreams without the interference of endless workdays. The former very much defines my work weeks, rising before dawn and working until dark managing a triple-booked calendar, partnerhood and motherhood on a razor’s edge of extreme time management.
But, as I rise on Saturday morning, I feel invigorated. The weekend is when my artist comes alive and I tap into what is most essential. When I start to see glimpses of a different life. Cuddles, coffee and reading in bed. Wiggling my toes under the covers and appreciating the smooth softness of my sheets. The warmth of my dog snoring next to me. The smell of my son’s shampoo as he greets me with a hug and a picture he drew me of a flower in the sunshine, just because. Opening my eyes and my mind to inspiration for the words I am eager to welcome to the page.
Is it enough to say it’s complicated? Is it indulgent or highfalutin to say I’m in the messy, beautiful, glorious process of self-actualizing? At once flourishing and languishing? Railing against the structures I’ve built my life around? Longing to break free? Inching ever closer, through it all, to an optimized and integrated state where my artist and I live and thrive as one?
I guess I’ll have to wait and see…
Soliloquy on Imperfectionism 