Who am I? Dr. Seuss knows.

Marc Chagall--"I and the Village"

“Be who you are and say what you feel because those who mind don’t matter and those who matter don’t mind.”  —Dr. Seuss

Ah, the wisdom of Dr. Seuss.  Some part of me has always believed a version of the words above.  So why am I trying to re-embrace them?  Even as a teenager I didn’t often feel the need to be who someone else expected me to be.  So why am I now feeling uncomfortable with myself and even with other people?

I know we all go through life passages.  And that there is no particular age or order or set of rules that we can follow.  That would make the passages easier maybe but also pretty boring.   And even if we had rules, a profound experience such as divorce would certainly upset the apple cart.  I think it has for me.  But I don’t know how much of my current stress level to blame on The Divorce.  I just know that I’m stressed and I don’t understand why.  I’ve been analyzing for days.

I know that the rejection of divorce changed who I thought I was.  Certainly it did some damage to my self-esteem.  But I thought I had that under control.  Then I started thinking (again!) about what I’m here for, what I want to do with the rest of my life.  As I’ve mentioned in previous posts, I have done a number of positive things to get back on track.  I think I made a good start.  Now I feel stagnant again.  Will Rogers once said, “Even if you’re on the right track, you’ll get run over if you just sit there.”  Whenever these sad and confusing feelings come over me, I start to think I’m not moving forward.  I’m sitting here.  Or I’m not moving fast enough.  That begs the question:  Fast enough for what or whom?  Maybe I’m too hard on myself.  But I don’t think that’s it.  My days are too disorganized and casual.  Every day is R&R if I decide it is.  I’m chuckling as I write this.  My older grandson was doing some painting for me this week.  He told me he had found a book when he moved some furniture.  When he handed it to me I looked at the title:  Organize Now! I started to laugh and said, “I know why I have this book.  Because I need it now!”

I know myself well enough to start slowly.  I’ve made a commitment to myself to declutter my house and my life.  I’ll keep you posted.  Pun intended.

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