Learning to life - and a sweet memory from my youth

I know the song is "Learning to fly". The latest lingo on forums is to transform nouns into verbs. As a result, I am learning to adult, learning to life, learning to parent, and... you get the gist.

This past week, anxiety reared its ugly head. Worry about my parents' health and the flu season sends me into a sinking-stomach spiraling feeling, and everything else feels less important. I suppose circumstances are still the same and we are grateful for that. But without significant improvements, there is also a cause for worry and anxiety. I have to figure out coping mechanisms because with December well on its way, I feel the dark clouds looming ahead and I am trying to keep them at bay.

I have to somehow get through the winter and early spring. My current goal is just to get through December. My husband and I had a talk and he suggested that we do a check in after the holidays regarding my anxiety. So all I need to do is to get through the holidays and I hope with the busyness of winding up at work, holiday parties, Christmas and time off work I am able to get through the next two weeks.

After that, we have the month of January to go. Jan and Feb are the heights of my anxiety. But my husband has reasoned with me that the days are already starting to get longer in those months and that spring is around the corner. I don't even know if I can rest easy once the weather is better but I suppose it seems like it might get easier.

There is tons to be grateful for and I am trying to focus on that. I gave myself a cheat day and ate dairy (daughter's birthday cake, husband's holiday party at work). While I enjoyed it, I didn't feel great after (mentally). So I'll go back to my dairy-free diet. It's hard to explain but on one hand I don't have concrete benefits from doing it. But on the other hand, I just feel better when I do it. So back to eliminating dairy it is.

I also need to do a purge and rearrangement of my home and I hope to get to that over the holidays. I am actually looking forward to cleaner and more organized spaces.

In the meantime, I am learning to life. How to continue to take care of our kids at the same level of commitment, but to find time to follow a meaningful career (and what would that be)? How to maintain an organized home and find time to follow my interests? How to go on regular evenings out with my husband and friends? Friends? How to make friends and be a support system to one another? How to focus on immediate family's needs and make happy memories while dealing with underlying anxiety? How to actually be, and find some peace and contentment? How to practice self care? How to nurture my family? To do or not to do social media? How to find a career path that I believe in? How to stop being resentful of colleagues and to stop letting career woes seep into other aspects of daily life? I have a lot of good practices in place, and I know the answer is to have a yoga/meditation practice to center myself, to keep writing, to practice gratitude and affirmations. To keep my goals in focus and work on small steps towards them. To keep adjusting and refining along the way and keep eyes and ears open for opportunities. To keep faith and update skill sets and to learn, learn and learn some more. Alright, I suppose I will do these for a start and see where it goes.

So I started out, on a dirty road. Started out, all alone.

I'm learning to fly, but I ain't got wings...

-Tom Petty

Back when I was in undergrad and probably around 19 or so, there was a day I vividly remember. A few friends and I had gone to an area outside the city near our college which happened to be a garden attached to a convent. While wandering there, we got drenched in a heavy downpour. I went home that day in an auto. While in the auto, I took out my walkman (was it a discman?) and listened to Learning to Fly by Tom Petty on my earphones. I still remember that exhilarated feeling I had that day. And the green cotton kurta I was wearing - I used to look and feel amazing in it. What sweet sweet days those were... and going home to my grandparents and dog after was just the best.