New Routes in the New Year

Let’s do this 2020! 

Looking back at the last few weeks of 2019, it’s been a pretty awesome transition to the new year so far.  My house filled up with love of family and friends via various visits and sleepovers and holiday fun, cookies galore, bonus fireworks ringing in the new year.

My surly tween spending sweet time with her nana (hubby’s mom) who was visiting, and little sister enjoying giggles and laughter with nana, too.  Lots of sleeping in and napping and trips to the beach and watching movies and playing games and eating all the holiday food.

More news has come out from the ex’s brother about the ex’s shenanigans—which feels strangely validating—but I’m doing my best to distance from the drama and just enjoy my time on this earth, with my rapidly growing girls.

Emotional habits are hard to break, but I’ve noticed the last couple of times that the girls have gone to their dad’s house, I haven’t curled up into a little ball of worry. 

So maybe that’s my resolution this year—whether you make them or not—and someone recently asked me if I do the resolution thing and my answer was:  if I have, I can’t remember? (Is this a side effect of aging? LOL!!!!)

But I do have a conscious thought and wish for this year:  to let go of negative thought patterns.  To let go of negative emotional reactive patterns.

To disrupt.

I want to disrupt the fear and anxiety that I’ve felt when it comes to the ex.  So I’m going to hold onto this peaceful distance that I’ve managed when it comes to him lately, and when I feel my head going to the dark space of worry and fear re: how he treats me and the girls, I’m going to disrupt that thought flow. 

And rise.

Above it all.

With everything I’ve got.

I’m not perfect at it, but I’ve done it a couple of times—it’s like I’m at the top of a slide and instead of going down the usual familiar path of worry and depressed thinking, I consciously choose to take the stairs, taking deep breaths and remembering that I can straighten my crown and put my best foot forward.

I’m seeing about applying this also to work, how to rise above the pressures of being the perfect boss, colleague and coworker.  The perfect wife, mother, sister, daughter, woman in this world.

I’m looking at how to disrupt these familiar chains of thinking that have bogged me down for so long.  I’m tired of the weight, the tunnel vision, the familiar drag, like I’m swimming across a clear blue sea with a school of nets tied to my ankles.

What is that saying, for people who’ve lived through trauma and abusive relationships?  We accept the love we think we deserve--because the pain and the sadness and the anxiety and the fear have become familiar.  It’s what we’re accustomed to, so anything that’s not fear or worry is unfamiliar and downright scary.  Healthy love and healthy thinking, when it appears before us, is like putting a left handed glove on a right hand.  It doesn’t quite feel right.

I want it to feel right. 

I’m done with these old train tracks running over my heart and mind and soul.  It’s time.  2020 is about making room for changes, making room for different tracks.  I’m going to give everything I have to disrupt these old routes and try something new.  Hopefully, I’ll get to lay down new tracks, I can feel the winds of change behind me, as I’ve worked to rise above the drama for the last couple of weeks. 

Here we go, 2020!  Can’t wait to see what happens next.

Love and hugs,

Jane Thrive