Things About Thoughts

The thing about the human mind is it's a closed loop. I mean, things get in. Lots of things, all the time - we are introducing new information into the little speed track in our head. But once something is in there, it never leaves. Even when you think it does. Even when you can't remember and you want to... it's still in there. Even the things you want to get out of your brain, they circle around and around and around. Like that time you saw your great uncle in his maroon underwear. Or that Selena Gomez song. It's there for keeps. Sure, you can practice real hard at filing those undesirables away and make a habit of repressing them. You might even be successful at forgetting most of the lyrics, but it will ALWAYS be there, somewhere.

I am not a bible thumper, usually, but there are a couple verses that I memorized as a kid that still surface in my thoughts at semi-useful times. One of them is the verse from Second Corinthians (yes, that's a real book in the bible, you heathen) that talks about taking every thought captive. Sure, it goes on to talk about obedience, blah blah, and in context it's about vain thoughts that are irreverent, which might be the thing in the world that I am best at, but the practice it refers to is a useful one.

"...Casting down imaginations, and every high thing that exalteth itself against the knowledge of God, and bringing into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ..." 

2 Corinthians 10:5 (KJV - because I may be a rebel, but I am an orthodox rebel)

This is one of my antidotes to anxiety. To grab the thoughts swirling inside my head, sit them down and try to filter them through an objective lens. It doesn't always work, but sometimes just the exercise of it gets my mind into a different rut than the panicked frenzy that it was prior to the attempt. And when you think about it, it's pretty much a rephrasing of what the great stoic philosopher Seneca said, that we suffer more often in our imagination than in reality.

“We are more often frightened than hurt; and we suffer more from imagination than from reality”

― Seneca

If I had a nickel for every time some random thought crept into my mind without any real basis and wrought havoc on my soul, I'd be a zillionaire. We all do it. At least I think we do. Or maybe I am just fucked up beyond all recognition. Thoughts like "nobody even likes me." Or "I'm such a dog," (welcome back, 1988). Or "the way he said goodbye - he was so happy to leave me..." or "my kids can't even stand me" - that's a good one. Where do these thoughts come from? If I knew, I would have the thought generator fired. But I can't, so there they are, forever in my mind. I can grab them one at a time and have a Reasonable Conversation with myself about the fact that they are erroneous. I might even be able to convince myself, but after awhile, a new wave of trauma, real or imagined, will wash them all out of the places where I have them neatly filed and they will slam into the walls of my mind with new ferocity.

And the waves never stop coming. Sometimes it's a tsunami after a break-up, or the death of a loved one, or when Hannah Montana quit being available on Netflix. Sometimes it's the gentle persistent lap of repeated hurts over time that erode the banks where we have stored those useless, baseless thoughts. Sometimes it's a hurricane of stress and life changes that leave everything in your mind topsy turvy and disheveled. Sometimes there are just SO MANY THINGS on your mind that it begins to pile up like an episode of hoarders and the bad thoughts are all mixed in with the good ones and the necessary ones and the memories and they begin to tarnish everything. 

How do we keep that shit cleaned up? I guess it's one thought at a time, just like a recovering hoarder, or after a hurricane. One by one, taking them captive, looking at them, putting them back where they belong. I guess trying to be prepared for the waves, trying to catch them when they're falling out of the vault, before they impact the serenity and stability of your day, of your imagination. Before they become worry and anxiety. Lock that shit up. It will never be completely gone, but you can see it for what it is and file it away and keep an eye on it so it will have a harder time escaping next time. 

There's no perfectly beautiful solution, because there is no perfectly beautiful mind - except Russel Crowe's, of course. But there are steps, there is a pathway to being less crazy. I've been walking it for awhile, in my own meandering and imperfect fashion. The bible talked about it to the Corinthians. Seneca said it before Jesus was an itch in the Holy Spirit's toga. It's a thing. 

Human minds have been inventing fear and trouble with their minds since they've began using them. Check out the wild imaginations of the earliest cave artists if you don't believe me. Our minds are the monsters that haunt us. Our mission is to conquer them. 

Things That Are Small

You know how they say "don't sweat the small stuff"? I was thinking about that today, and how it's true. And it's easy to get all wound up about things, that in the scheme of Real Life, are not really big issues. Like if the kids have head lice. Or whether the dogs have fleas. Or if the rug in the hallway is drenched because the toilet flooded again while I was gone and NOONE (this is my newest adopted child) wants to tell me. And it would be REALLY easy to FREAK the HECK out about any of these. Or all of them at once, since that's how they generally come, but really, no amount of freaking out has ever gotten rid of lice. Or anything at all. Other than annoying people. Freaking out at them enough usually does the trick. Not that I have tried. *innocent stare

But if we IGNORE the small stuff, it can get REALLY BIG. Like, you know, lice in the Whole Entire School. Or stuff like that. And also, if we aren't paying attention to the small stuff, we miss some of the best parts of life. Not head lice, or fleas, or toilet floods. But we miss things like how the bathroom air freshener at the Northside Costco smells EXACTLY like a brand new Strawberry Shortcake doll from 1984. Which smells EXACTLY like my birthday.

Or we might not notice that when we walk in to the house and Fun. is blaring on the stereo at 7,000 decibels that it probably means that an 11 year old is doing her Best Job Ever on the dishes. Like 15 minutes scrubbing and drying each Hydroflask lid. The small stuff. Nevermind the pile of crockpots full of applesauce we made with Lofty Intentions for canning last week and forgot about. And the stuck on mashed potato pot. Those lids are SPARKLING. The small things. And Fun. is loud. And it's good. Especially since Aspen probably has no idea what "getting higher than the empire state" in the bathroom really is.

If you weren't paying attention to the small stuff, you might forget that you finally got a flipping HEATED MATTRESS PAD at like 70% off, and that means that even if NOONE brought in pellets for the stove, once again, and your rotator cuff/laboral tear and bulging disk absolutely dictate to you that you sure as HECK ain't doing it, you will still sleep warm tonight. And you might forget that your sheets are tossing all warm and clean in a Brand New Dryer sitting by a Brand New Washer.

Or you might not have read that piece of junk mail that offered you DirectTV for $29.99 a month, and you might not have called and talked to Jared at CenturyLink, who would not only refund all of the overcharges/late charges that were NOT YOUR FAULT, but he'd hook you up with some sweet NFL Sunday Ticket action for $25 a month AND a $50 cash card AND could quite possibly be the love of your life. If only he wasn't married.

If the small stuff didn't matter, then you wouldn't care when a very tiny wiener dog confided in you that Nobody Can Replace You, and also: You Are The Best Mom in the Whole World.

It's because I was foolishly ignoring the small stuff that I left my Fitbit 1 (one) home this morning and now I don't know if I should really be drinking this one glass of wine. Or why in the heck my hip hurts so bad. Not that they need to be sweated, but at least remembered. So you can get credit, and have ice cream and stuff. And ignoring the small stuff led to me not paying attention when Kiz told me that her boyfriend had a high fever and sore throat for three days, and not COMMANDING her to not visit him, to prevent the spread of the plague into our house.

Even though there is some BIG STUFF this week that maybe needs to be sweated, like divorce papers, which are the printed equivalent of a big fat kick in the gut, and double shifts at work, followedimmediately (<---- see how I did that?) by all-nighter at a BOY'S house his birthday for all the older girls, which I will obviously be chaperoning, and figuring out how to deal with teenagers that probably think they got away with "borrowing" the car and driving it sans licenses... all that stuff can, and will be sweated about. Probably through my tear ducts and into my pillow, but there's still the small stuff. There's really loud Fun. when you would have probably played some terrible sad song over and over to go with the continuous rain. The small stuff that doesn't have to be sweated, when you realize that mayonnaise as a lice remedy is also a kick-a** hair conditioner, and all this pestilence equates a Really Clean House (someday), and life is actually really, really good. Because of the small stuff. Heated mattress pads. Wiener dogs. Fun.

(please note: the one minor reference to alcohol in the preceding blog is compensated for in this drink riddled but very happy video. Here's to the small things... Carry On!)