#ConniesYearOfSelfCare2019 Part 2

Photo by Suzy Hazelwood from Pexels

In Part 1 I talked about how I came to make self care my theme for 2019 and how I was allowing myself time to figure out exactly what I wanted that to mean. I also mentioned that I was writing about it mostly to keep it top of mind, because I've struggled with that in the past.

Well, I have good news on both fronts. I now have a list of habits, essentially, that I had already started and want to continue, that I want to improve upon, or that I want to even start in the first place...and that I believe will contribute to improving my health. More on that later.

Also, remarkably, self care has stayed top of mind so far. I honestly think the biggest reason is that I changed my Facebook cover photo to the graphic that accompanied Part 1. You don't see your own profile photo as often as you look at others', but I've found myself going back to my own profile to look for something often enough that I end up thinking "oh right, self care!" relatively frequently. I also put a reminder in my phone for the first of every month: "This year is about self care!" So...better living through technology, I guess!

* * * *

So...here's the habit list, broken down by minimum frequency. (What I'm not going to do is say—at least yet—how well I'm doing on each of these. I gotta have some secrets. ;)

Twice daily
Taking supplements

Daily

Walking or other exercise

Dental care

Skin care

Meditation

Reading

Twice Weekly
Stretching

Weekly

Acupuncture

Yoga

Creative hobby (such as coloring, music, calligraphy/lettering, photography)

Monthly

Reiki

Massage

Yearly

Vacation

There's probably more that could be added to this list. But these are my focus, at least for now.

* * * *

Next time I'll have to share about a workshop I attended in January. Its content seriously has the potential to change my life. Some workshops you don't end up getting much out of, but not this one! I mean, it's May, and I'm still thinking about it. Stay tuned!

My Conversation With Ta-Nehisi Coates

The card from Mr. Coates' appearance.
To hear audio of the late Ms. Hooker
telling a small part of her story, click here.

A few weeks ago, I saw that Ta-Nehisi Coates was coming to town—and got excited. Then I saw that the tickets were free, and I got really excited. I'd read his best-selling and National Book Award-winning Between the World and Me in 2017, and it had blown my mind. (You can read my review here.)

So on a chilly evening in the middle of February, I and a handful of others queued up outside Ohio State's Mershon Auditorium to be among the first to enter and try to obtain the best seats we could.

Though this was billed as a lecture, there was very little of Mr. Coates standing at the lectern and speaking. After a few opening remarks, he read a bit from Between; then he and Don Pope-Davis (Dean of OSU's College of Education and Human Ecology) sat and had a conversation.

One of the things that surprised me about Mr. Coates was that he's funnier than I would've expected. I think that's because his writing is often so...heavy. His subject broadly is race in this country—clearly no picnic, and he writes about it with devastating skill.

After the conversation with Dean Pope-Davis, Mr. Coates took a few questions from the audience. And I came prepared. I'd been wondering for almost 2 years about something he'd written in Between.

Here is a (slightly-edited version of) what I asked him:

In Between the World and Me, you talked about a concept you called what white people were called before they were white. And you named some examples, including some ethnic identity labels. I thought what you might be implying was that everyone who came to this country who was not indigenous to this continent or brought here by force would have done well to continue all along using their original ethnic identity labels and that their descendants now would do well to revert to such labels. So I thought I could start calling myself a German-English-American. But then I thought, well that's kind of unwieldy, so why don't I use "European-American?" But then I mentioned this whole concept to some friends who happened to be very...aware, and they said they were really uncomfortable with that because "European-American" is what certain far-right hate groups call themselves. I was like, "Oooh, I did not know that," and "you will not hear that from me again." But I was left wondering: when I took it there in my head, was that a step too far in terms of what you meant? Or in any case could you expound on that for us?

In reply, he spoke for several minutes, and I can't reproduce all of that here, but I'll share the points that stood out to me the most:

• Race is power [emphasis mine] and often violence. He postulated that our definitions (in this country) of Black and of White come directly from slavery. Because there's no other, global definition of those terms outside of the enslaved/enslaving experience. He said something I hadn't thought of before, that if he'd been born in another time and/or place, he would very probably have been labeled something else.
• He got a laugh (but also meant it seriously, I'm sure) when he said that if en masse the people who believe they are white stopped believing that...it would solve the problem. Two things: If you don't know what we mean by people believing they are white, you need to read Between the World and Me. The other thing I notice is: He said that they would need to stop believing it, not just...stop calling themselves that. Two different things.
• As an individual, one cannot overturn racism by themselves. This seems obvious, but the reason I'm talking about it here is: that's one thing I wish I'd done in my question, stated that I certainly knew I wasn't going to make any kind of huge impact just by re-labeling myself. I mean, I do remember thinking that I should share the idea with friends and maybe together we could make it "a thing," but in any case I certainly knew that we were not going to upend the whole thing on our own.
• As a follow-on from the previous point, he said something that really struck me: that I can no more escape being racially white that he can escape being racially black [emphasis his]. Again, that's not how I viewed it. I didn't think, "This is how I can escape being white!" But this is still a striking thought. We white people cannot get away from the fact of what our forbears did. "What we are bearing is history." And given that my ancestors are (as far as I know) German and English, I'm bearing some pretty heavy history—colonialism and genocide, in addition to slavery. I'd never thought about it in quite this way before. 
• Our ideas about how change happens tend to be very individual; we don't have a concept of generational struggle. We don't tend to hear people talking about their goal being 200 years hence, the whole idea of whiteness would disappear. 

  We don't need people with blue eyes to disappear; we don't need people with blond hair to disappear. We mean: the language that we put and the power that we attribute and the credit we give people simply for the bare fact of having those things.

• This year, 2019, is exactly 400 years from the first time captured Africans were delivered to Jamestown, Virginia. "You are bearing 400 years of weight." 
• "There are things that white people can do to be less white." This got a laugh. But he meant it seriously and in the sense that there are things white people can do to not contribute to structural inequality: Don't contribute to the racial divide if you happen to move into a gentrifying neighborhood; for example, don't set up neighborhood chats that only include people who moved into the neighborhood in the last couple of years. Don't start movements to create separate public school districts that "just so happen" to include only residents of a certain class. Don't call the police because homeless people are hanging out in the park..
• "It's less about what you name yourself right now and more about what you do."

I'd say it's the last one that's the most important. Labels and the specific words we use for them aren't unimportant, but they aren't nearly as important as what we're doing to contribute to what he called the "generational struggle" of undoing structural inequality. 

What are we doing to truly work toward justice and equality—for all?

Maybe You Hate This Day

Maybe you hate this day.

Maybe you're seeing all the social media posts from your friends who are clearly in love.

Maybe you're seeing all the bouquets at work that aren't for you.

Maybe you went into any store within the last week and felt like you had to walk through a gauntlet of triggers, thanks to hearts everywhere.

Maybe you're just missing your person that much more today.

Maybe you had special Valentine's Day memories with your person.

Maybe you didn't, and today just makes you wish you had.

Maybe you've never gotten to experience a romantic Valentine's Day in your life.

Maybe you've never 'had a person' in that way, but you achingly wish for that.

Maybe you've achingly wished for that for years, and...you'd stop wanting it if you could, but you can never seem to pull that one off.

Maybe you've started to wonder if it will ever happen for you.

Maybe this day, as much as you tell yourself you're going to ignore it, breaks through anyway—because our culture is just. so. relentless. with its holidays, and it wears away your resolve to soldier through, unmoved.

Maybe you know that today, the tears are inevitable.

If any of this describes you or if today brings any kind of unique pain for you, I want you to know:

I see you.
I get it.
My heart is with you.

Your pain is valid. And don't let anyone tell you otherwise—or shame you for feeling it.
You are worthy of love and belonging.
You are not alone.

#ConniesYearOfSelfCare2019: Part 1

I can't remember the moment when I began thinking about making this my theme for 2019. I just know I started thinking about it sometime before the start of the new year, and then, on January 1st, I made this graphic and changed my Facebook cover photo to it. I do remember realizing that at the very least, I needed to be taking a lot better care of myself than I presently do.

The fact that I turn 50 in less than 6 months could also have something to do with it.... ;)

Then there's always the chronic conditions that are the bane of my existence, namely depression, low energy, and acid reflux, to name the top three. They will get none better (and indeed will probably get worse) if I simply maintain the status quo.

Anyway, I'm sharing this journey as much to help keep it top of mind as anything else. Because I know from too much experience how difficult it can be to see something through that you start in January. So I figured writing about it could be a way to make it more of a 'thing.'

* * * *

The fact that it's a theme and not a resolution is very much on purpose. As I alluded to above, I've done the set-a-resolution-with-too-little-follow-through thing before. (Yeah, not fun when you realize later how poorly a resolution you'd set turned out.) Enough so that for a few years there, I stopped making resolutions and I think for some of those years, didn't even try to think about changing anything in particular. Even though a lot needs to be changed.

* * * *

The beautiful thing is that after only a little over two weeks into the new year, I've realized a few things that feel significant.

First, it dawned on me that I didn't have to figure out the "one right thing" to work on or habit to try to implement or whatever...on or before January 1. I could take some time to figure out what better self care will look like for me in 2019. So...I'm giving myself time to figure it out. I'm letting it be OK that I don't have the entire set of definitive answers—yet.

I think part of my follow-through problems in the past (well, besides being not great at it generally, lol) was: the more I tied any resolution to the start of a new year, the more I told myself "I'm going to do X every day," the greater the chances, it seemed, that it would fail. I think it just created too much pressure.

Second, since I started using a self-care journal (second link below) and writing down whatever I'd done in a given day that seemed self-care-ish, I was able to realize: I'm doing more that fits into the self-care category than I'd realized, so it's not like everything is garbage...and maybe I need to cut myself a break. How's that for a revelation.

* * * *

The other brilliant (I thought ;) idea I had was to during January schedule as many of my self-care appointments for the year as possible. That way they're already set up and I don't have to worry about scheduling any more of them until next year. So—I now have one massage and reiki appointment each scheduled for every month in 2019. I still need to do the same for an eye doctor appointment and possibly a medical wellness check. I'm also giving acupuncture a real try, but I don't know how long I'll be getting it regularly because I don't know yet how much it's helping me. (It can have a cumulative effect, and I'm still waiting to see if enough good effect will accumulate to make it worth it.)

Here are some of the other things I've done so far to further my self care in 2019:

• Read The Self-Care Project by Jayne Hardy (founder and CEO of The Blurt Foundation, which provides support and resources to people with depression)
• Bought and began using this self-care journal (And by the way, I'm letting it be OK if I don't write in it every single day.)
• Divided up my supplements so I can begin taking them twice instead of once a day, for better results (sometimes, it's the little things...)
• Set a reading goal (of 24 books) for the year, finished the one I was reading when the new year started, read a second, started on a third (I joined a book club late last year, so I'm hopeful that will motivate me to choose reading over, say, Netflix more often than I did last year)

* * * *

So...that's where I'm at. Here's to the journey as it unfolds.