No U-Turn

I recently heard someone say that the creative person's mind is like a browser with 2,500 windows open. That's exactly what I feel like, all day, every day. I'm stuck in the main window and feeling anxious about all the stuff that I should be doing in those other windows. I have no choice but to work at a full-time, paying job and although there are many opportunities to be creative in my position, there doesn't seem to be much time left over to satisfy my personal creative self. To complicate that further, my job involves making home visits. There are days when I may spend over four hours in the car. I have not yet figured out how to write, make jewelry or sculpt while I'm driving. Considering the way that people drive on the expressways in Tulsa, I think that some of them very well may have. Amidst all the crazy traffic today, I was inspired on the road when a lone "No U-Turn" sign caught my attention like a flare. It burned its way into my inner tirade: "Don't you idiots realize that you're driving a 2,000 machine that could hurt somebody?"

What I'm dancing around here is a major fault of mine that I've been working on changing for a very long time. I'm not sure that I can honestly say that I'm working on changing it, as I probably do more thinking than doing. The thinking has not all been for naught, as I have a great deal of the why's analyzed. I know that I lack self-confidence because I have rarely gotten support from anyone close to me, especially that guy named Cash. I also know that this really shouldn't matter, because as the skin on my Writing.com account says: "Keep away from people who try to belittle your ambitions. Small people always do that, but the really great make you feel that you, too, can become great" ~ Mark Twain.

Just when I almost reach the finish line, I pull a U-turn. Whether it's fear of failure or fear of success, I haven't yet determined. I think it's a little of both with success in the lead. The challenge of dealing with the fear is a challenge that I should be able to overcome. After all, I raised three boys as a single mom, on "welfare," and obtained not only my Master's degree, but also the most prestigious award given at the graduate level. I have proven to myself that I can probably do anything that I focus on, but over the last two decades a nasty little nemesis decided to come and live with me. Chronic pain and the plethora of challenges that come with it have brought me to my knees when things were going well more than once. The pain is a result of a long-undiagnosed broken vertebra and the two botched surgeries that were supposed to fix it. There's a certain level that doesn't bother me anymore. Something hurts every day. It's there. It's become a part of who I am. I have developed physical and spiritual practices to help deal with it. I choose to work because having something to do outside myself keeps me sane by distraction. When it exceeds that level, I and everything around me falls apart. But there's something worse than pain. Buddha summed it up when he said, "Desire is the cause of all suffering." The fatigue that prevents me from doing what I want to do is by far more difficult to deal with.

Success typically results in more work. My fear of success comes from being concerned that my body will not allow me to keep up with what needs to be done. That's very, very scary.

Now, back to driving. Radio isn't what it used to be. Truth be told, it gets on my last nerve with a commercial for a certain issue particular to males every fifteen minutes. There is even a huge billboard off the highway in the city. At the risk of offending some male readers, I must say that I agree with Roseanne Barr when she said, "Some things are just meant to come to an end." I listen to CD's. I may get stuck on one music CD for two or three months. My current favorite is Adele - Live At Royal Albert Hall. I also listen to books and self-help CD's, such as Anthony Robbins. He makes a great point on one of the early sessions of his Personal Power program when he says, "If you're not going to do it, then I'd rather you just stop listening right now."

I think I hate goal-setting more than I hate cleaning the bathroom. It's a struggle. When I do set goals, I do seem to at least take some steps toward them. I certainly do better than when I don't set goals at all. Not only do I need to set those goals and take action, I also need to make a new rule for myself: No U-Turn.

Maybe I should look for my own "No U-Turn" sign. Chalkboards seem to be big in the craft stores this season. I can just make one, right? Or, maybe I should get a tattoo. Yeah, that's it - no escaping that one!