Wednesday
Better emotional regulation*. Top of my list of things to work on in 2018 and lately, I can see why.
The last three days have been a roller coaster of stress, emotions, fleeting pink cloud moments of feeling on top of the world and dark “what am I even doing” thoughts that traveled down the familiar negative groove.
I guess that’s one of the helpful things about journaling. It allows one to see how changeable everything is, even when it can feel so overwhelmingly permanent in the moment.
In the final chapters of This Naked Mind and I will say some of her brain retraining might be sinking in. I plan to do a little recap of it when I’m done, but in the meantime, I’m gonna leave today with the hand-written quote on the notecard I received with a t-shirt:
The happiness of your life depends on the quality of your thoughts.
Gratitude Postscript
This morning, in direct contrast to yesterday’s debacle (of course), went very smoothly. Boys snuck into bed with me in the middle of the night, but I was able to sneak out at 6am to do my quick workout and they slept through it – phew! The rest of the day has continued in similar fashion. Not necessarily easy, but without a hitch. I’m grateful for that. And I’m grateful for the treasure of unselfconscious little boy laughter coming from down the hall as C gives the boys a bath.
*Just wrapping up a 15-minute meltdown with Little C at the end of the night. He’s sitting on my lap as I type this, exhausted. Talk about a lesson in the importance of emotional regulation – if not, we’re not much better than a stormy 4-year-old… and that’s not pretty. Emotions, big or small, come and go — it’s important to know that we control them, not the other way around. Such an easy concept, so hard to live. [Edit: The tantrum actually lasted for another 40 minutes after I finished the post, just for the record]