worry and stress

I was reading some of my old journals and in them I'd written about how I wanted to get rid of this anxiety and stress and I realized I've been dealing with this issue for years! I guess it's my "vice" other than my blackberry.

When I was in Nepal I told Tim - another traveler - I didn't have any vices. All the guys on the film crew smoked and drinked and cursed heavily, among other things, and I didn't even drink most of the whole trip. I do drink on occasion it certainly is not a vice. I gave up smoking when I was 20. Many moons ago. So here I was thinking I didn't have any vices then I got home and whammo! I realized that my crackberry is my addiction! My email, my computer. It can be bad. One day I gave myself an "email fast" and I think I'm going to do that again tomorrow. Maybe... Can't I just check it once? Pretty please?

So besides the crackberry vice it's also that I have a sort of "too much to do" stress feeling all the time and I say "I'm stressed". I don't have like panic attacks or anything of any sort. I just feel a sort of random overwhelm feeling. And darned if you don't know what? I think it's related to the email!!! Because I never have stress when I travel - even if I do check email it's not constantly like when I'm at home.

I got to thinking that it could even the answer - or one answer- to that question of the other day about how do I get that stressless, larger than feeling while at home as opposed to just when I'm traveling... Get rid of the stinkin email! Or at least the addiction. The thing with email is that it's like a Giant To Do List!!!!

So the other day I told myself, you know what I'm DONE with Stress! I'm done with it. Just cut it right out of my life. I said, OK everytime I feel the stress, I'm just going to mentally observe it, take a deep breath and take things one minute at a time. One project at a time. Bird by Bird. Then this quote came across my email...

"I would take a vow not to worry so much but I would have to have a prefrontal lobotomy to keep the vow and that seems excessive." -- Ellen Gilchrist in The Writing Life.

Bwa ha ha ha ha!!! That's about how it's been working for me, so far.