Yesterday was the first official Mental Health Day of the season. I booked myself a day off work and booked a 90 minute spa session at a local bathhouse with a sauna. It felt good to feel warm all the way through outside of bed, without a hot water bottle. I also tried infrared light therapy just because I could. No idea if it had any measurable / physical effects, but the bright light shining on my face (eyes goggled) felt like I was sitting in the sun with the light falling over my face. Something about that sensation is very primal and nostalgic for me. I feel like I and am five or six years old again, somewhere near the ocean, or in the harbour where I grew up. I get a sense of bird-of-pardise plants and ice plant and osteospermum growing nearby, and the slap of water against rocks, and the faintest hint of the scent of the ocean.
I had lots of thoughts & ideas floating around in my head at the time, and but with no way to note them down they’ve all flitted away now. I also had plenty of time where I just completely spaced out. It was really relaxing and recharged my batteries, and I should do that sort of thing more often. It’s part of the eternal self-care battle / executive dysfunction theme that I seem to be fixated on at the moment. Why do I always find it so easy to take care of others’ needs and so hard to do things for myself that I know I will benefit from?
Now that we’ve made it past the solstice, I can feel some of the weight lifting, but the battle isn’t over yet.
The main struggle I still have right now is just being tired of the notion of a 9-5, five day a week job. Maybe it really is time to give myself a chance to try some new structure to earn a living. I’m still wary that I’m building up too much of a fantasy — that in reality it’ll turn out to be a different kind of hard. On the other hand, there’s only one way to find out, and that’s to give it a try. Nothing will disabuse my notions of living the self-employed dream better than having a crack at it and experiencing the downsides first hand.
For now I’ve committed to seeing out the rest of the year of my current contract and I’m OK with sticking with it. A girl can dream, though.
Outside of work I’ve been enjoying this new podcasting endeavor. For a long time I’ve wanted to have a collaborative project like this, and it’s been really really enjoyable to finally kick one off. I’m forever conscious that consistency and regularity aren’t my strong suits, but so far I don’t get the sense that it’s going to be too onerous. I think the key will be to just focus on what feels most fun and not worry too much about the perceived production quality. I’m well aware that our audio is janky, my mixing and sound editing skills are nearly non-existant, and on the production planning we’re just making it up as we go along. But we sure laugh a lot while we’re doing it, so hopefully some other people join us for ride.
Episode 2 is about to drop tomorrow, so like and subscribe, etc. blah de blah!