I am trying to be all non-judging and peaceful; appreciating all things and emitting a high energy field, but people keep doing things like spitting out their car doors at red lights and leaving their abandoned grocery carts next to my car in the parking lot when the cart home thingy is 2 more parking spaces down. I mean, seriously, you couldn’t walk it that far? It’s hard to be appreciative of people’s suchness when they say things to me like, What??? You’ve never seen Repo Man? How can you have never seen Repo Man???!!!!!
I saw a book on the NPR site called Helping Me Help Myself: One Skeptic, Ten Self-Help Gurus, and a Year on the Brink of the Comfort Zone by Beth Lisick. This is the kind of book I would like, a sort of CliffsNotes of self help, or self improvement, or whatever it’s called. The thing is, I could have written this book myself. I don’t know why, but these kind of books really appeal to me. Maybe it’s hereditary; I can remember my mom reading Wayne Dyer’s Your Erroneous Zones, which I actually though was a dirty book, and I couldn’t believe she just kept it on her nightstand table like that. I mean, couldn’t she at least hide it under her pillow during the day? I have read The Joy Diet by Martha Beck, which in part is about doing what you love, feasting on life, and giving yourself treats. I can give myself treats. That’s why my skinny jeans are tight, and why I read books on work out motivation instead of actually going to the gym. I read The Four Agreements and I already forgot three of them. I mean, there were only four to remember, you’d think I could hold those in my memory. I got “don’t take things personally” down. Well, I mean I remember that as one of the agreements, I may never actually have that one under control, but I am working on it. Peace is Every Step by Thich Nhat Hanh was a good one about operating on a higher level, but some parts were too weird for my practical mind. Here’s an excerpt:
I have lost my smile,
but don’t worry.
The dandelion has it.
What? What does that mean? Clearly I need more study.
Part of the reason for all of my searching had to do with work. I was trying to make work I really didn’t enjoy anymore become meaningful. Look, can reading a book do that? Here’s the best career advice: Do what you are. Do what plays on your strengths, what you can do and enjoy, so that you can do what you really love on the side, without the pressure of money making and supporting yourself and your family. Sometimes the American dream feels like you are supposed to do what you love until you hate it. Love to cook? Get a restaurant and cook 15 hours a day until the sight of a kitchen makes you feel tired and defeated. Wow- I am getting cynical! What I am looking for is motivation to write and work out. Well, for the work out, I may never become some bounce out of bed and work out type of girl. You just have to go. The best workout advice I ever read was “don’t ask yourself how you feel about it, just get up and go.” Stephen King has similar advice for writing, you have to write. Wow- that’s good stuff. In order to write, you have to write. But it’s true, it’s not that complicated. If you want to write, write. If you want to work out, work out.
So whatever the reason, I will most likely always be reading something self improvement. Not that there’s anything wrong with that. My friend Liz says we are introspective types. That sounds better than “addicted to self help.”
