Do things. Just do things.

Why (not) now?

The question isn't so much: Why am I starting this online journal? Why am I doing this now?  The question is: Why not?  Why not now?

For the majority of my 30's, I've been feeling more and more frustrated with the reality that I am a dreamer, and not a doer.  It has always been a part of my identity - to be a dreamer, somewhat free-spirited, and more of an ideas person - and I used to be okay with it, even celebrating it at times.  But as the years have gone by, I have become annoyed with myself, my indecisiveness, and my lack of follow-through.  Every time I heard myself thinking up a great idea or writing a To Do List, instead of getting excited or feeling like I was ready to be productive, I would feel myself rolling my eyes... at myself.  Because I had come to believe, based on all those things I said I was going to do, that in reality, I wasn't actually going to do anything.  All the while, life was happening, and I was continuing to feel unmotivated and started to also feel lost, in all aspects of my life.

Timing is everything, they say.  It takes a perfect storm to hit your rockbottom and finally, make the decision, to make a freaking change.  I agree with this.

In May 2016, after many counseling sessions, months of analyzing the What If's, making pro and con lists, and mourning the reality of the inevitable, my boyfriend of six years and I decided it made the most sense to end our relationship.  We had both changed in our feelings of marriage and having children and were no longer on the same page.  We grieved our relationship, together, for a full month before moving out of our apartment and into our own, separate spaces in different quadrants of Portland, a city we had moved to together, knowing no one else, two years prior.  Then came the next phase of grieving on my own where I found the most unexpected moments were the hardest - like immediately tearing up at the grocery store when I reached for the gallon of milk that we used to get, instead of the smaller one.  I had a really hard time in those moments of moving from "we" to "I."  In normal conversations, I constantly had to remind and train myself that there no longer was a "we."  It was "I."  

Eventually, I was able to get through a day without crying.  Then, a few days.  Then, a week.  And after a few weeks, my new norm was without him.  I thought I should maybe take advantage of this "fresh start" to get myself focused on the things I said I was going to do and wanted to do.  A month passed, and another month, and I was back to my old routine of making To Do lists that I didn't actually do and scheduling deadlines that I very easily rationalize delaying.  And what I felt before - unmotivated and lost - was still there, even stronger actually.  Except now, without my best friend in my daily life, I just felt purposeless.  And I honestly didn't quite know what to do about it.

And then I was sitting in the Newmark Theatre in downtown Portland for an Academy on the topic of "Think Better, Live Better."  The session of speakers was part of the World Domination Summit (WDS), an annual conference of sorts that I had attended the year prior.  As a sat in that theater, I don't know if I consciously made the decision to be open but looking back, here I was - coming into this moment feeling lost and unmotivated, having verbalized that I felt "purposeless" the week prior - and it was exactly where I needed to be.  Timing is everything.  All of the speakers were great and then this woman, Kendra Wright, got on stage in leather pants and this amazing bob-with-bangs haircut that I've dreamed of having if only my hair could be super shiny and straight.  During her talk, she said five words that changed something in me, in almost an instant: Do things.  Just do things.  

I have had the thought of creating this online journal since March 2010.  I could have (and have) rationalized and thought it was better to wait for some special occasion like New Year's Day, my birthday, or some other day that I deemed was important enough to do something I knew I wanted to do.  Instead, I just did it.  Why now?  Why today?  How about Why not now?  Why not today?  I am just going to do things.  Every.  Damn.  Day.  And today is a beautiful - maybe the most beautiful - day to start an online journal.