Inspiration – Beautiful Minds Inspire Others

Beating Imposter Syndrome, Inspiration, This is me

Big Alice, Muchness, and Me

Posted on September 6, 2024 by Dr. B.

I was doing my devotion and reading this morning and this just happened to be one of those days where everything from the different books and readings that I use in the mornings lined up. I think a lot of us spend a lot of time in our lives trying to make ourselves fit into the boxes that other people have for us. Recently, there’s been a TikTok video trend about being demure and mindful, and I think that is one thing that a lot of us have maybe tried to do for most of our lives. Trying to be quiet enough or not boisterous so we don’t bother people; laugh, but not too loud; cry, but don’t ugly cry; be you, but make you fit the molds of society. These are things that a lot of people struggle with throughout their lives and make themselves fit into, even when it is uncomfortable and foreign to them and feels like a lie.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying go out and be as loud as you want and way what you want and to heck with everyone else’s thoughts or feelings. I am still a southern girl and that need to be kind and gracious will always be ingrained in who I am. As I read this morning, though, I realized that when I try to fit into the boxes others have built for me, I’m not fitting into the person that I was designed to be. For me, I believe that God has designed me the way He wanted, for a specific purpose (that may or may not be known to me yet). That means the loud, funny person that I like to be also has a spot at the table with the girl that strives to be classy and smart. He gave me all of those things.

The last thing I read this morning was Chapter 10 of You are the Girl for the Job by Jess Connolly. I’ve been reading a chapter each day of this book. It’s funny, I bought the book on a whim from an email that I received recommending it and decided that I would work it into my devotional time each morning at the end to transition from my devotions to working. I thought it would be helpful to bridge the gap and make things fit together. What I didn’t anticipate was that it would speak to me so much. The chapter this morning has a section about Big Alice from the newer version of Alice in Wonderland and talks about the courage that it takes to be Big Alice. It also talks about the word very found in Joshua 1:7 and how that word translates back in Hebrew to meod, which translates into muchness. Interesting that a word that may or may not really be a word (muchness) is found in Alice in Wonderland and in the Bible. I wouldn’t typically look for similarities in those two works, but today it really spoke to me.

Why do we try to hide our muchness? What does it mean to have the courage of Big Alice and how could our muchness help us feel more at ease with ourselves and help us grow into the people that God designed us to be? How can we keep from being little Alice and losing our muchness? How do we help the muchness move from “in there” to being our true selves? It is a lot of questions this morning, but also some clarity in becoming who I am meant to be. For me, I need a reminder that my muchness is part of who God intended me to be, so I made a poster. Feel free to download it if you want, print it, whatever. Hopefully it is helpful to someone, I know I’m printing it and putting it at my desk at home as a reminder to be who I am.

Until next time, just remember:

Come on out, Big Alice. The world needs your muchness.

Inspiration, This is me

Sunday Funday … or is it?

Posted on July 21, 2024 by Dr. B.

Sunday Funday. That’s a phrase I hear often and even one I have used myself. I was cleaning out some books yesterday and found one that I had gotten to try to incorporate more Sunday Fundays when the kids were little. As I looked at it, I realized that I didn’t even open it up enough to bend the spine. Last night, I took everyone to a Smokies baseball game. I had the whole thing planned out. It was Christmas in July night, they were giving away snowglobes, you could make ornaments, all the fun. We got there late so didn’t get a snowglobe (mind you, late was still 45 minutes before first pitch), it poured the rain on us, we only saw 1.5 innings of baseball, and there were no fireworks.

I look at both of those things and realize how bummed out I got that it didn’t turn out perfectly for either one. I also look at the fact that we ended up trying a new restaurant and laughing a lot at the game. We did make ornaments, and now we can go today and watch a doubleheader because our tickets are honored for that game since it rained so much and we saw so little baseball.

It seems like we all put a lot of pressure on ourselves to have the perfect Sunday fundays or the perfect experiences for our families, especially when our kids are little. What I have realized throughout the years is that it wasn’t the big things that made the difference. Sure, my kids have loved the Disney trips, but they’ve also loved the impromptu picnics or cooking dinner at the firehall. The random trips to Chattanooga to go to the children’s museum and the random movie nights at the house. They’ve even enjoyed the nights we just didn’t do anything “special” besides have dinner together.

Why do we continue to put an immense amount of pressure on ourselves to do more and to do it perfectly? It almost never ends up going as planned and then it can cause a spiral into a place where we just don’t feel like anything we do is good enough for our family. The birthday parties aren’t big enough, the gifts aren’t extravagant enough, the trips aren’t special enough, when in actuality what makes it all special is the time we spend together and focusing on each other.

Sunday funday today is going to be a lot of baseball, but most Sundays it is a lot of rest. It’s eating together, going to the grocery store together, maybe watching a movie together or maybe everyone going their separate ways. Stop putting so much pressure on yourself for it to all look perfect and start enjoying the small mundane things that make up our lives. Instead of planning the perfect outing for the day, jump in the car, turn on a fun playlist and sing together or have a great conversation while you just drive.

Enjoy each other today, regardless of how that looks.

Inspiration, This is me

Comparison is a Punk!

Posted on July 14, 2024 by Dr. B.

Comparison is a punk. It is the thief of joy, the happiness stealer, the confidence killer. It takes people that are doing great things and makes them feel not enough.

Comparison is the thief of joy - Theodore Roosevelt

So why am I starting with that? It was part of my devotional readings this morning, and it just hit me out of nowhere that we are in the midst of the season of comparison. It is summer where I am, that means comparing your body to others, your tan to others, your boat to the boat across the lake, your choices of how to spend your free time with how others are spending their free time, your plans for your classroom that don’t feel like they are ever enough because you’ve seen someone else’s and those are amazing.

Don't measure your progress using someone else's ruler

What really hit me this morning, though, is that not only does comparison do all of those things (and so many more), it also steals our gratitude. It gives us a constant need to look over our shoulder and see what everyone else is doing. It doesn’t allow for us to be content. What is interesting is that even with all of that, I think there is value to watching what is happening around us and being inspired by it.

You see, I don’t think being inspired by what others are doing is bad. I think it is the way that we allow our minds to interpret what we are seeing is bad. I think looking at what someone else has accomplished and using it to make ourselves feel inadequate is bad. There is a difference between being inspired to do something and beating ourselves up because we aren’t already doing it. Maybe it isn’t our time to do that yet. Maybe we need to learn more. Maybe we are spending so much time looking outward that we aren’t realizing what we are actually contributing to the world.

I am by no means a Bible scholar. I still look at the table of contents to find the books of the Bible, no matter how much my Sunday School teachers tried to get me to memorize them. I can’t quote Scripture off the top of my head, and I don’t want to get in heavy theological discussions because I feel like I don’t bring much to the table. All that aside, I realized this past week when talking to a potential colleague that I’m still contributing. Just like you can do anything else explicitly or implicitly, you can contribute to the world in that way, too. For me, I will never be the person that is leading the Bible studies or devotions. Most of the time I struggle to do my devotions without getting sidetracked. For the first time, I don’t feel like that is a bad thing. Maybe that is just my way. Perhaps, just like I am working on a book that gives “permission” to be the teacher you want to be, I also need to adopt that I can be the Christian that I want to be. My journey and relationship with God doesn’t have to look like everyone else’s. That doesn’t mean it isn’t just as important to me.

Perhaps the best way that we can be the person that God intended us to be is simply to be the person that feels right. Perhaps comparison really is stealing so many things from us, but most importantly time. Maybe comparison is stealing time that I could be spending being the person God wants me to be because I am too worried about being the person that I think is “right.” Maybe this is all too deep for a Sunday morning, but it is what just felt like it needed to come out of me today.

Beating Imposter Syndrome, Inspiration, This is me

Imposter Syndrome Continued

Posted on February 15, 2021February 15, 2021 by Dr. B.

First off, let me just say that I was truly overwhelmed by the response to my post last week about Imposter Syndrome. I was amazed that my post seemed to resonate with so many people, and that so many of the people that I heard from were people that I never expected to feel the same way. Since there was such a response, I have decided to dedicate the next few weeks to taking a deep look at imposter syndrome and how it changes my life.

Let’s start off with actually defining what imposter syndrome looks like. The common characteristics (according to verywellmind.com) include:

Self-Doubt
An inability to realistically assess your competence and skills
Attributing your success to external factors
Berating your performance
Fear that you won’t live up to expectations
Overachieving
Sabotaging your own success
Setting very challenging goals and feeling disappointed when you fall short

For some people, imposter syndrome serves as motivation to achieve something larger than what they are currently achieving. I happen to have this as one of the ways it manifests. It causes me to work harder than necessary and push harder than I probably should in an effort to keep other people from finding out I am a “fraud” and sets me up that I see the reason that I succeed as the direct result of my extra effort. I ask myself (on a more than regular basis) what gives me the right to be doing the things I am doing. One of the funnier things about this is that I just got my degrees hung in my office after Christmas, and I am continually looking at them for reassurance that I really am qualified to be doing the things I am doing. Doing things well doesn’t even make me think that I am qualified because I keep going back to the only reason that I succeed is because I worked my way or lucked my way into it.

It is said that 70% of people will experience imposter syndrome at some point in life, even though it isn’t an officially recognized disorder in the DSM-5, but it appears to show up in multiple different ways. Strangely enough, I can recognize parts of each of these in my own journey.

The first one is called the perfectionist. I definitely fit within this one most of the time. I tend to focus on flaws I see in myself or mistakes that I have made. I am the first to look at something I have done and see the 5 ways I could have done it better. I also tend to set very high goals for myself, even though I go totally off the track towards my goal when I first make a mistake or don’t make the progress that I think I should have made.

Another “personality” of imposter syndrome is the expert. This manifests by never being satisfied with the level of skill or understanding that I have and continually writing my own expertise and experiences off as not enough. This is one of those spots where I jokingly say I am looking for the adultier adult in the room or looking for the person that is supposed to be teaching the class only to realize that I am the one who is supposed to be teaching and I am the one in the room that is supposed to be the one with the most knowledge or responsibility. It is important to realize that this is very different that just seeking more knowledge. Seeking more knowledge on the topic is something that I feel I should be doing just as a responsible person.

Another way it shows up is as the “natural genius.” The way this one shows up is that it hits people who are used to succeeding or things coming to them “naturally” but when there is something that they can’t figure out quite as easily or they don’t get quite as fast as they perceive others to be getting it. It often leads to thoughts along the lines of if I was smarter, this would be easier or if I was better, it would come more naturally. The natural genius tends to have a hard time when they don’t succeed at the lofty goal they set on the first try.

The soloist tends to looks at everything as something that should have been accomplished with no help from anyone else. These people tend to prefer to work alone, and perceive asking for help as a sign of weakness or incompetence, regardless of how much it could benefit them.

The last one is the superhero. The superhero has an overwhelming need to be the one that does it all. They need to be the “fixer” of anything that has gone wrong and feel compelled to push themselves to work as hard (or harder) than humanly possible. These people (and I am one of them) tend to have a need to feel as if they are indispensable to others, and use that thought process as proof that they have to work harder to get to the same spots as others. They also have a hard time taking a break, can shut down from the smallest pieces of criticism, and think they should be great at everything.

Like I said, I can see myself in all 5 of these at any given point in my life (or sometimes in my day). I can’t say that it makes it easier to get past this by knowing this is what I am doing, but I am trying to get a little better each day about recognizing what my thoughts about myself are doing to me. I have also started trying to make an effort to at least label which of the 5 types I am in the middle of when things happen. My hope is that drawing awareness to what I am doing and how I am thinking will help me to move beyond those thoughts. That being said, how do you see these “personalities” manifesting in your imposter syndrome? Is it helpful to know about the different types? Next week, I am going to look at ways to cope and start moving beyond imposter syndrome.

Inspiration, This is me

I Refuse…

Posted on January 17, 2021 by Dr. B.

It’s a big week. This is going to be a big week for our country (regardless of which side you are on), a big week at the gym, a big week at school, and a big week for me. The country part is fairly obvious, and all I will say is I just hope people can start to Be Kind again, regardless of whether we agree or disagree. I miss when we could disagree on something and it was okay. I miss when the push wasn’t to be a keyboard warrior, but to be a good person. Politics aside, I sincerely hope we can start to heal and come together to celebrate our differences instead of fight about them. In fact, I will just say it. I refuse to not be kind.

It’s also a big week at the gym. This week we have our first seminar, and it is about setting goals. I am a huge goal setter, and I actually teach how to set goals in my classes, so I am super stoked about this event. I am also a little nervous about it. We haven’t done this before, and I am in charge of planning it. I put a lot of pressure on myself to do things well, and that can lead to being pretty down on myself if something doesn’t go exactly as planned. Let’s be clear, it isn’t because I think I am perfect that this bothers me, it is because I feel like I let someone down. Something will happen not according to plan, and that is how we can learn and do better for the next time. This week, I refuse to forget that flaws are how we learn and grow.

This week is also a big week at school. It’s the first (almost) full week of classes. Granted, we don’t have class on Monday because of MLK day, but it is the first time most classes will meet more than just the day 1 syllabus talk kind of day. I love the beginning of a new semester, but it is also a time that is a little nerve-wracking for teachers and students of all ages. For those of us in higher ed, each new semester or quarter is like starting a new academic year. There are huge hopes and dreams that are mired in expectations and standards, and those can be overwhelming. When you tack the normal stuff on top of a pandemic, a country at odds from within, pandemic fatigue, and lots of outside noise thinking about the beginning of this semester can be a little overwhelming. So this semester I refuse to get mired down in the constant stuff outside of my classroom so I can simply control what is happening within my classroom.

That gets us to it being a big week for me. Personally. Now, you may laugh about what I am getting ready to tell you, and that’s okay. I’m kind of laughing, too. It is still a big deal in my head for whatever reason. This week I turn 40. I don’t know why I am having a hard time with it. It is the first birthday where I can say that I finally feel like I am doing what I am supposed to be doing and have a career that I love. It’s also a little hard to look and realize that I came into that career really late. I’m 40, with one semester as a full-time faculty member under my belt. I’m 40 with a daughter that is going to college next year. Life is changing a lot this year, and maybe that is why I am dreading this big number. Why couldn’t it have been 39? Anyway, I really don’t like the way I am feeling about turning 40. I also don’t like that I am dreading my birthday. It could also have something to do with the fact that I am pretty sure the day before my birthday is going to be slightly nuts. Regardless, I am going to try to stop it now. In fact, I refuse to let myself dwell on getting older.

That seems like a lot of negativity for a space that I don’t normally let get negative. Maybe it isn’t negative, it is just me thinking about what lies ahead. In actuality, I am really trying to take a stand against the negativity that could typically find a way into my head to prevent it from getting in there and multiplying. One of the things I have found about myself is that it doesn’t take much for the negative thoughts to start and it takes even less for them to multiply exponentially. This is my way of drawing that line. It is the way that I am going to remind myself about growth when I feel overwhelmed or like things aren’t going right. It is how I’m going to remind myself to cut myself the same slack I cut others. It’s how I’m reminding myself that age is just a number. I refuse to let this week get the best of me.

Inspiration, This is me

New Year, but Not Necessarily a New Me

Posted on January 5, 2021 by Dr. B.

Happy New Year!! It is once again that time of year where people set goals to be better, fitter, nicer, healthier, more intentional, more prayerful, calmer, more peaceful, etc. Every other advertisement I see or hear is chanting the words, “New Year, New You,” and showing beautiful people. I am not judging, in fact, I have been a person that said New Year, New Me multiple times. I have set the goals that sounded great and were right in line with what other people were doing, and I have even been picking a word for the year for the past few years.

This year, I am just not feeling it. I keep questioning why it has to be a “New” me or a “New” you. Why are we setting goals for the pretty? Are we actually reflecting and thinking about how we could improve? Are we actually thinking about whether the goal we are setting is attainable? I teach students how to set SMART goals in one of my classes, and the things that I continually have to help them revise are Specific, Measurable, and Attainable. It seems like some of this push to be New is actually also pushing to not appreciate where you are and where you started.

I don’t want to be a new person, I’ve worked to hard to get to the person I am

In all actuality, after doing this new year, new person thing for all of these years, I want off this ride. I have finally, this year, started liking who I am more and recognizing all the things I have done and worked through to get to this point. Maybe it is because I turn 40 in just a couple weeks; maybe it is because I am finally in the career that I want to be in and I am doing the things I want to do; maybe it is because I am afraid to set another goal about getting fit that falls flat because of injury; or maybe I am just scared to set a goal in this weird time in which we are living. I don’t really know, but I do know that New Year, New Me (or You) is really rubbing me the wrong way this year.

But, where does that leave me? Can I just not do the resolution thing? Spoiler alert: I have really bad FOMO, so that probably isn’t an option. Can I just ignore the ads and the people around me? Spoiler alert #2: I’m not great at ignoring things that irritate my soul. So, what do I do now? And why does this bother me so much? I think it bothers me because I want myself (and others) to want to grow without losing what makes them uniquely them. I don’t want to turn into a new person, I just want to be a better version of this person. Heck, there are even some things that I think I do pretty well and don’t want to change. I think I will just keep the trend I have done for the past few years and choose a word for the year, set some goals to enhance the person that already exists, and then put my nose to the grindstone. The word thing is something I found several years ago (2020 – Intentional, 2019 – Pause, 2018 – Grace) and it is the thing that has helped me conquer the FOMO and try to focus on bettering myself. I got the idea from a friend, then quickly went and researched on blogs and OneWord365. For me, the word is always something that just comes to me during the last couple of weeks of the year for the next year. It sticks around in my head until I admit that is the word, then I try to set mini goals for myself with that word in mind. By mini-goals, I really mean little ones. Sometimes it is as simple as a goal to make myself stop and breathe with no work or music for 5 minutes a day for the next 5 days (Pause) or to eat lunch away from my desk (Intentional). They aren’t necessarily large words, and they are not necessarily large goals, but they are always things that allow me to feel like I am moving forward to becoming a better _____________ (fill in the blank with whatever thing I am trying to accomplish at that moment) while still maintaining who I am at my core.

So, this year, the word that kept coming to me was Routine. To be totally honest, I hated it. It sounds boring and unimaginative, and I just couldn’t think of any way to jazz up routine. I also knew deep down that I really needed to work on establishing better routines in my life to keep me from being overwhelmed. I thought about it some more, then went to Facebook (because that’s what everyone does, right) and asked the OneWord365 community for suggestions on what to do when you don’t like your word. I got several suggestions, including a change to the word that makes it exactly what I wanted, and more importantly what I need.

Rhythm speaks to me on so many levels, and so that is how I am setting my goals this year. That is how I will enhance the person that I already am and grow towards being more than what I am currently. This year, I want to work on my rhythm. The rhythm of my life, the rhythm of my work, even the rests that make the rhythm mean more. So, if you are like me and hate New Year, New You, or just don’t get the resolution thing, try choosing a word. Maybe your word will be for the month. Sometimes I choose a word for a day (typically it is Breathe and happens when things are way out of rhythm). Whatever you do, do it for you. Do it to grow in who you are and who you want to be. Just don’t forget who you are now.

Inspiration, This is me

Just Make a List…

Posted on December 2, 2020 by Dr. B.

December is finally here. I feel like I have been waiting on it since March. One of the things that I am really good at is making a list. I love lists. I love to check things off the list. I love to color code my lists. You get the idea. However, as much as I like making lists, I have struggled for years during the month of November. You see, a lot of the people on social media that I am friends with or follow take the month of November to express their gratitude. I have tried this in the past, but always felt like I was falling short of the goal. My friends always had these beautiful things that they were saying and that they were grateful for and I was always feeling like I could come up with a few things that I could write those beautiful words about, then I was grateful for things like coffee and twinkly lights. I just didn’t feel like I could write about being grateful for the little things because it would look petty next to the others.

I then decided that I just wouldn’t do it. I just wouldn’t participate in Gratitude Month (November) because I didn’t want people to think I wasn’t grateful and I didn’t want to leave anyone out. Last year, I just skipped it all. I was grateful for things, I just didn’t post them. Then we got to 2020. It just didn’t feel right to skip listing the things I was grateful for with everything that has been going on in the world. I stewed about it for a little while, and then I received the answer one day while I was reading a book by one of my favorite authors, Bob Goff.

When I did one of the readings in early November, he talked about a friend of his that started each day by writing the 10 things he was grateful for on that day. I took this idea and ran with it. It made perfect sense because if I was listing 10 things each day, I felt like I was ok having a few of them be the little things. I also thought about how hard this semester has been on myself and all other educators and students. I decided to challenge my students that are currently teachers to write a list of 10 things they are grateful for each day when they got into their classrooms. I also set a goal for myself to do the same thing and to put my list on Instagram by doing a live video every morning when I made my list. For the most part, I have managed to do this almost every day, and it has certainly made a difference. In the reading, one of the things was trying to change the way we think. One example is instead of lamenting how much work we have to do, being grateful that we have a job. I have tried very hard to be grateful for at least one thing per day that I am typically unhappy or complaining about. I can safely say that now, after a couple of weeks of doing this, I am starting to think of things differently.

I have preached to my children and my students for years to choose joy, and while I try to do that there has just been a piece missing. I was still getting upset way too often about things that really didn’t matter in the grand scheme of things. By trying to flip my thinking, I have found myself finally able to choose joy and mean it. The glass isn’t half empty, I’m just happy to have a glass with something in it. I know that sounds super Suzy Sunshine, and I am definitely not Suzy Sunshine, but I truly mean it. Trying to change the framework in which I think about the things that bother me has been something that continues to bless me.

This semester, and really this year, have been so trying for so many people. It is an easy time for us all to think on the negative side of things. In fact, it is what we have seen happening increasingly all over social media and the news. We are all tired. We are all over being scared of this pandemic. Everybody wants life to go back to normal. I personally just want people to start being kind to each other again. Try making yourself a gratitude list. Not a big one with the big things, but a small one done each morning. Allow yourself to be really grateful for the silly stuff along with the big stuff.

Inspiration, This is me, Uncategorized

Take a Break!!

Posted on October 6, 2020October 6, 2020 by Dr. B.

Stop working so hard! Have I gotten your attention yet? Before anyone comments that I am promoting laziness, please know that I am definitely not doing that. I am just telling you to make sure you are taking a break every now and then. With the movement of so many people to working from home due to the pandemic, a lot of the lines between work and home got blurred, if not erased all together. If you are leaving work every single day and you are feeling like your gas tank is permanently running on fumes, there is something wrong.

We are all guilty of it. We work just a little longer to finish up the day’s tasks. I hate having things on my to do list that don’t get checked off by the end of the day. I have a need for there to be no notifications on my phone or iPad because that signifies that something needs my attention. I will repeat: Quit working so hard!! I have to say it to myself (and I’m a horrible listener when I tell myself something). I am writing tonight, from my office, because I just finished teaching and wanted to finish up a couple of things. Writing a blog post has been on there for several days, so I decided to mark it off the list tonight.

Why are some of us so driven? I know the reasons for motivation and drive. I get intrinsic and extrinsic value. But what makes us push beyond normal limits? Is it a fight against perception? Sometimes I really think it is. Maybe it is that we don’t want to be perceived as lazy or expendable. Maybe it is because we like to feel important and needed. If we just work a few more minutes, or maybe another hour, we prove how helpful we can be. When we prove ourselves, people need us more. Or at least that’s a theory.

I have another theory for the push to keep moving. I think sometimes we are afraid of what will happen if we stop. I do realize that could go with what I just wrote as well, and there is some fear of being not needed if we don’t keep proving our worth. Think about it though, how many times have you heard the saying, “I will rest when I’m dead,” and how do you relate that to your life? Is the motivation to keep going synonymous with a fear of what happens when we stop?

How does that fall in with this pandemic? Does that add another layer of if I keep moving, it means I am healthy? Are we turning our homes into this?

It's OK to Miss the Office During the Coronavirus Lockdown - WSJ — Where is the work/life balance?

Who suffers the most when we lose the boundaries between our work time and our home time? The argument could be made that it is our children, and it is a very good argument. The argument could be made that it is our relationships with our family members or the ways in which we deal with stress when stress is present in every aspect of our life. I think it is changing us in ways we don’t even think about. For instance, have you emailed someone over the weekend and gotten irritated that they didn’t respond? Does everything seem like an urgent situation to you? I have heard the term surge capacity several times over the past couple of weeks. At first I thought it was a crazy term being used to make excuses. I’ve done a little more research (just a little, don’t have time to do much), and I am a believer. I think most of us have hit or exceeded our surge capacity limits. The world feels upside down and topsy turvy, and it seems to be getting crazier by the day.

Our Brains Struggle to Process This Much Stress | Elemental — Somebody put us back to right side up.

I don’t know how to solve the problems, and I’m really not even certain I know what all the problems are at this point. I do know this, we have got to take a break and get off the merry go round every now and then. We have got to start reestablishing the lines between work and home life.

50 Ways to Take a Break from: https://themostefficient.com/50-ways-to-take-a-break-infographic-brain-breaks-for-adults/

There are some great resources out there to help you re-establish those boundaries. I found the graphic above, along with some really great ideas for both work and home, at https://themostefficient.com/50-ways-to-take-a-break-infographic-brain-breaks-for-adults/. There are a ton of things that I don’t understand, and what is going on in the world is right up there near the top. I do know one thing for certain; if we all keep working this hard, we are all going to end up broken.

Take your foot off the gas and don't push yourself too hard. If you need to rest, then take a break. The… | Inspirational words, Be gentle with yourself, Cool words

So give yourself some grace, set some boundaries, and look up from your work. These things can only help you feel better.

CrossFit, Inspiration, This is me

40 before I hit 40

Posted on October 18, 2019 by Dr. B.

So, after an extremely long few weeks at work, I am finally on Fall Break, and I had a realization this morning. It is right at 16 months before I turn 40. I was sitting here, trying to decide what to do with my day, and I thought about going to get a book to read. That, of course, led me down a rabbit hole on Pinterest trying to figure out what book I wanted to go get, which eventually led to me figuring out how long it is until I turn 40.

16 Months. Just 16 months. I don’t feel almost 40. I mean, I guess my knees definitely feel over 40, but in my mind I don’t feel like I have been alive that long. Since I realized how close I am to getting there (after David did since he hit 40 this year), I decided I want to do something special, set a goal to reach between now and then. I am actually going to set 2 goals.

40 Before 40 image with colorful dots

Goal 1

Starting this month, I want to read 40 books before I turn 40, but to do that I need your help…

I have no clue what I want to read. I have spent so much time reading for education or reading to/with my kids that I don’t even know what to read anymore. Leave me a comment with your top books so I can make my list.

Lots of books on shelves with vintage hanging lights

Goal 2

I am going to do 40 hero/memorial workouts in the next 16 months. I will probably have to scale them (see the over 40 year old knees comment), but I really want to do something cool between now and then. Leave me your favorite hero/memorial WOD in the comments, too. Get ready Mossy Creek Fitness, I am ready to come back from this stupid mono thing with a vengeance!

Boo from Monsters, Inc. Dressed as a monster with Gym Time #BEASTMODE

My plan is to blog about each book and workout as I finish it, but I really need help finding all the books and workouts. Let’s see if I can hit this goal!

Inspiration, This is me

Not My Comfort Zone

Posted on June 27, 2019September 18, 2020 by Dr. B.

If you know me, you know I am a slight control freak. By slight, I actually mean living in a constant state of having a totally over the top need to know exactly what is going on, how it is happening, when it is happening, what the next step is, who is going to be there, etc. I don’t really like when plans change (shocker), and I am not a huge fan of the unknown. Somehow, all of those things that I hate managed to happen this week. B was invited to a huge Jr. Young Leaders Conference this summer, which is great. The not great part of it is that it is almost 9 hours away form home. I decided, about a month and a half ago, that instead of driving back and forth so much, I would get an apartment on AirBnB and David, Alyssa and I could come up and spend the week. Of course, plans didn’t work out the way I had them set up. David had meetings he couldn’t move, Alyssa got her wisdom teeth out, and when they released the schedule for B, he had to be there earlier than we thought. After thinking through all of that, I ended up in an apartment 9 hours away from home by myself.

As much as I enjoy having some time to myself, this, plus a few other things seems to have thrown me into a tailspin this week. I never really thought of myself as having anxiety, but last weekend it has practically paralyzed me. I cried all weekend. I managed to be ok for most of the drive, but then we hit traffic. It was at the point that we hit nasty traffic that I truly began to realize how much anxiety I was having. I got B dropped off, then made my way back to the apartment I had rented for the week. Keeping in mind that I was tired, and starving, the actuality of bursting into tears when I even thought of having to go find some food happened quickly. I finally got it together enough to go to a grocery store about a block and a half away, and managed to get food to last me through the week. That was Sunday night, and I didn’t leave the apartment again (other than to go downstairs to the Starbucks on Monday morning) until Wednesday.

So why am I telling all this on my blog? First off, to dispel the myth that I have it all together. For the past few years, I have had people say things like, “I don’t know how you do it all” and “You manage to balance everything, how do you keep everything together,” but in actuality, I don’t have it all together.

It’s also been hard to navigate being off my normal schedule while I am also trying to deal with the anxiety. Without workouts with my Mossy Creek Fitness family to burn off steam, and without my family around to distract me, I have actually had to face the anxiety as it hit. Thankfully, I had some great help. With lots of talks with my husband, lots of soul-searching and journaling, and a great visit with my cousin, I managed to get out of the apartment yesterday. We went to Arlington, and had a great time!!

So, while it hasn’t quite been the week I had planned, it has definitely been a week that I will end up celebrating. I managed to work through some things, and figured out some ways that I can work through things in the future. I also learned a lot about myself.

I am definitely a small town, southern girl.
Big cities are nice for vacation, but I miss my mountains and cows.
I like to go on vacation, but not by myself.
I like alone time, but not this much alone time. I love the time I have been spending on my back deck this summer, but I also love being able to go inside and spend time with my family.
I do not do well when I skip devotions. I have never been someone that set aside my time for God. In fact, I have tried to do that in the past few years, only to get bored, or feel like I am not doing it correctly (that’s a topic for a whole other blog post). Since I have been setting aside time for devotions this summer, I have really begun to look forward to that time each day. I missed my time on Saturday, and on Sunday, but when I made time on Monday, it made a huge difference in my day.

I am definitely ready to be home, and I can’t wait to hit the road tomorrow. I am even more excited that I get to spend the next week on vacation with David, the kids, and my parents! There might even be some mountains involved.