Some useful introspection
Had a bit of an "ah-ha" moment this weekend. One of the things I realised, sparked in part with conversations with Anton and Sarah, is that I have a poverty mindset. These days I have a good job and own a home but I was pretty impoverished for most of my twenties, when I was going through my penniless-poet-starving-in-a-garret routine.
To this day, some part of me is afraid that my career and life will catastrophically fall to pieces and I will return to the years when I used to sweat over whether I could afford a bag of groceries.
Every fear has a reason for being. And this one keeps me in work and stops me squandering money. The cost of this fear, however, is that it associates putting effort behind what I really want to do with my life with anxiety and poverty. Just like last month when I did a poetry reading, I was surprised how I associated it with being poor - as well as the deaths of one of my best friends and his wife. Once I actually did the reading however, all the things I enjoyed about it came flooding back.
Unpicking all this stuff felt very liberating. Although I had to work through a mess of frustrated feeling to get there. This not helped by my computer getting a galling virus which erased all the music stored in my iTunes, and accidentally smashing a pate and two glasses.
I worked on a prose piece called Pop, however, which I've had for a while. I am now editing it and trimming off all the flab, and it is taking shape as a short story to be proud of. I also went for a couple of hours brisk walk in intermittent rain on a Sunday afternoon, which much improved my mood.
When I returned Anton called me: Anna and the bairns were at his mum's house. So we took advantage of this having a few early-evening drinks in several local pubs which were full of a relaxed Sunday vibe. Good fun drifting from place to place listening to different music, or musicians, and chatting.
Then home to my last, and most cheerful, chat of the weekend with Sarah. And fairly early to bed.
Had a bit of an "ah-ha" moment this weekend. One of the things I realised, sparked in part with conversations with Anton and Sarah, is that I have a poverty mindset. These days I have a good job and own a home but I was pretty impoverished for most of my twenties, when I was going through my penniless-poet-starving-in-a-garret routine.
To this day, some part of me is afraid that my career and life will catastrophically fall to pieces and I will return to the years when I used to sweat over whether I could afford a bag of groceries.
Every fear has a reason for being. And this one keeps me in work and stops me squandering money. The cost of this fear, however, is that it associates putting effort behind what I really want to do with my life with anxiety and poverty. Just like last month when I did a poetry reading, I was surprised how I associated it with being poor - as well as the deaths of one of my best friends and his wife. Once I actually did the reading however, all the things I enjoyed about it came flooding back.
Unpicking all this stuff felt very liberating. Although I had to work through a mess of frustrated feeling to get there. This not helped by my computer getting a galling virus which erased all the music stored in my iTunes, and accidentally smashing a pate and two glasses.
I worked on a prose piece called Pop, however, which I've had for a while. I am now editing it and trimming off all the flab, and it is taking shape as a short story to be proud of. I also went for a couple of hours brisk walk in intermittent rain on a Sunday afternoon, which much improved my mood.
When I returned Anton called me: Anna and the bairns were at his mum's house. So we took advantage of this having a few early-evening drinks in several local pubs which were full of a relaxed Sunday vibe. Good fun drifting from place to place listening to different music, or musicians, and chatting.
Then home to my last, and most cheerful, chat of the weekend with Sarah. And fairly early to bed.
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