45. If you have 1 million dollars, what will you do with it?

I think this is one of those questions we all fantasize about. 1 million bucks is a lot, but at the same time it's not.  I especially know this from working in insurance that you can blow through 1 million dollars a lot faster than you think.  So, I would do my best to be practical with the majority of it by paying off debts for myself and my immediate family. I'd also like to invest enough that I have something that would generate a decent amount of income that I don't have to work if I don't want to and still get my basic needs met. I'll still keep working anyway, but I'll feel a lot more secure knowing that if something happens where I can't work, I'll still be ok.  I know, I'm boring.

Then after all that's set up, I'd go to Disneyworld.

44. How can you do this better the next time?

Wow... I forgot about my list. I guess the craziness of life has gotten in the way.  Since my last question, I've had a lot go on.  Of course, the biggest thing is the fact that I got engaged and will be getting married next week.  It was a long road to get here, too...

I suppose my positive strides are a result of following Question 44 a little more. I am trying to continue opening up more, learning to ask people more often when I need help and staying more goal oriented. It's not always easier, but it has helped.  I think being more comfortable being in a real partnership has made this process better, especially since I know I have someone that can support me and doesn't tear me down.  All in all, I'm still on the right path as long as I remind myself to focus better and plan ahead a bit more.

My own Aziz Ansari moment

Aziz Ansari has a fantastic show on Netflix right now called Master of None. If you haven't checked it out, you really should.  One of the episodes, Ladies and Gentleman, tackles the still very real issue of sexism all around us.  And it's often so hard to see from the outside, it's insidious.  Many men don't see the casual comments, the behaviors that can be outright scary, the way women have to constantly think of their own safety in their interactions.  This episode did an excellent job of discussing those same issues without getting overly preachy or trying to hard to resolve it, except to tell men, "Don't be creepy". Which you would think would be a pretty easy thing to follow. Sadly, it isn't.  Which leads to my own personal Aziz Ansari moment...

Last week, I decided to go to the bar to have a beer with a friend.  There we were, enjoying ourselves and clearly having our own personal conversation. I'd just gone to NYC with my fiancé to see the Rockettes and visit a new cat café. Yes. A café! Filled with cats!  Seriously, what could be more awesome?  There I am showing her the photos of the weekend with my fiancé. There is literally a picture of my fiancé on the phone screen up and in full view, when the obviously drunk guy sitting at the bar next to me taps me on the shoulder to tell me that I am "mad sexy".  I don't know how else to reply except to say, "thank you" and attempt return to my conversation. 

Again, he tries to start a conversation and talks about how beautiful I am, wants to know how old I am and if I'm seeing anyone.  I reply that I have a fiancé, upon which the guy starts to bemoan my lack of singleness.  I try to return to my conversation again, but he continues to interrupt and ask if I'm really engaged.  Yes, I reply, showing the phone with my fiancé's photo still clearly displayed, "This is him."  This apparently dumbfounds the man, who cannot comprehend that I am taken. He continues to say how unfair it is that I'm engaged and that he's lost his chance. 

Then he asks for a hug.  I decline, stating that wouldn't be right, especially since I have a fiancé.  This is when he starts to argue, asking why he can't get a hug.  I was already a little freaked out before, but at this point things start getting more dicey.  In my mind, I want to say, "Because I don't want to hug you and you shouldn't get a hug from a total stranger just because you asked!  I don't like you and I've been trying to ignore you and stop your conversation this entire time, but you won't listen!  Leave me alone!" But, I can't do that because I'm seriously concerned that it would escalate things and I could get hurt.  And this is a very real fear. 

And it really is, I don't know if men understand how situations like this can be scary.  But that creepy guy can easily turn into that guy that could seriously hurt you in a second.  You don't want to set someone off who does have the capacity to overpower you.  As much as I wanted to stand up and tell him to stop this, it's not appropriate, it's not right and you shouldn't feel that it's ok to step over boundaries like that, I didn't stick up for myself. Instead I just found myself trying to calm the situation by telling him it's ok, he didn't do anything wrong, it's just because I didn't feel right about it. Essentially, I apologized for my reaction to his behavior.

And I knew I shouldn't have to apologize, but I still did it anyways.  It made me feel bad that I had to mitigate my own responses in order to protect myself and that I'm the one that has to stay on guard when all I want to do is sit at a bar and have a beer with a friend.  But it also makes me angry that I need to do these things in the first place.  I shouldn't have to go out in public with the expectation that someone normally thinks it's ok to do things that do cross the lines of appropriate behavior and that it's socially acceptable.  It should be an obvious thought, "Hey, maybe I shouldn't do creepy things."  Sadly, that's not how the world works and for the time being, I will have to continue to stay on guard until times and society changes.

43. For every experience you get: What are the biggest things you have learned?

Hmm...  I do think there are certain points in my life that have shaped me.  And not all of them in positive ways, but even the bad times have still taught me something.  I try to look at what I went through in my marriage as a learning experience.  It did teach me to "survive" although I hate that word, survivor.  I don't know how I can call myself a survivor when even years later, I'm still dealing with the effects of what I went through.  But I don't have a better term to use, so I suppose that's better than nothing. The marriage did teach me a way of acting and seeing the world that I'm still trying to undo, though.

Leaving my marriage, however taught me how strong I could really be.  It also taught me that I deserved someone to treat me well.  I deserved to be happy and I deserved good things in my life.  It's something I have to remind myself of, but I think I've made some slow progress in learning to accept that I deserve better than what I actually had.  I also learned that people can be incredibly caring and understanding even when you may have made some poor decisions.

My father's illness and death taught me to appreciate my loved ones.  Tragedy either brings people together or it tears them apart.  I was very lucky in that my family and friends banded together and were able to make my father's last months as good as possible.  And we were able to support each other, as well.  I learned that the worst times often bring out the best in people.  I learned that cancer fucking sucks and I never want to watch someone go through that again.  But I also learned that if I ever get sick, I hope I go down fighting like my dad did, even though he was crazy and angry to the end. He also never admitted defeat and there's something to be said for that. I also learned that I was lucky that when my dad passed, he did it with neither of us having unfinished business, questions or regrets and that he died knowing how much he was loved, no matter what. It taught me to make sure to cherish my other relationships, so they know how important they are, too.

When I lost a job for a really stupid reason a few years back, I learned that my tendency to try to take on too much responsibility and try to be the person who can do anything and fix everything is unhealthy.  I have to remind myself to slow down, to take care of myself when I'm overwhelmed and sometimes even stop and take a break and breathe.  It is still incredibly hard.  It's even harder to admit when I need help, that I really can't do everything.  It's hard to let go, but I have to.

When I joined the Army, I learned that I could be a part of a bigger picture.  I learned a sense of discipline and a different type of self-worth.  I learned that I could strike out on my own and be ok in a foreign place.  I could get out of my comfort zone, do something that most people might find crazy and I could push myself beyond my limits, physically and mentally.  I learned that I also never wanted to work in law enforcement again.  The Army, however, was a great experience and I truly believe that more people should give service to their country in some way.

I learned many, many years ago that I met the one person who "completes me" to be all Jerry Maguire about it.  I was too young to recognize it for what it was.  But I was also lucky enough to get a second chance.  People enter your lives when they're supposed to. And my person came along again at a point when I was better equipped to open myself and appreciate it.  It taught me again that sometimes it's worth it to take a chance if it makes your life happier and more fulfilling.  It taught me that it's ok to do what makes me happy, instead of what I think I'm supposed to do.  And it taught me that sometimes the hardest things bring the best rewards.

Hopefully, I will have more lessons to learn.

Break on through to the other side...

So, earlier this week I did something completely crazy and out of character. I actually went to visit a psychic. Yes, really. My friend Katrina was having a psychic party and asked me to come. I hadn't seen Katrina in quite some time anyway, so I figured even if the psychic end was silly or useless, st worst I'd get to have a nice time with a friend.

Which is how I ended up at the office of Cindy Newcomb with about twelve other people.  I really wasn't expecting much, maybe some vague statements. Probably nothing that would have much impact on what was actually going on in my life. Needless to say, I was proven wrong. Now I know it sounds absolutely crazy, but I ended up having an experience that touched me in ways I couldn't have imagined and brought to a head everything I was struggling with. It was almost a transcendent and slightly frightening experience. Either this woman is an amazing instant researcher, just really good st reading body language or she has some other gift, whatever that is. All I know is it hit me hard.

So, how did it turn around so fast? In the first five minutes, she had me stand up and told me that Helen was there. And Helen isn't exactly the most common name, but it is the name of my grandmother. There were other little facts that a stranger shouldn't know. Things that even my friends don't know. Even if somehow this woman got my name ahead of time, I don't know how she would have been able to find those things about me. So, that definitlly opened me up to give what she said a chance.

For the next three hours, I watched this woman proceed to go through the lives of everyone in the office. And some of the things she said were pretty impressive and on point, especially the insights she was able to bring out. But, those are their stories and it is not my place to share those with the world. What I will say is that watching her do this with so many others and still be able to share such specific insights with such different people also helped me to listen. At times it was more like a counseling session than a reading.

Which comes to my story. She told me my father was there and that he was sorry about how he acted because of his tools. Now for some background, when my father was diagnosed with cancer, the hardest thing for him was having to watch us shut down his industrial supply business. To say he was angry is an understatement and he made it abundantly clear to us how angry he was, convinced that we were all working against him. Losing his business was worse than the cancer that killed him, because that business was his life. So, hearing that my father was sorry for the way he acted was like a weight lifted. And maybe none of it was real. Maybe she's just really good at reading people. But I'm still going to keep those words with me.

I think I've been doing better about opening up about the struggles I've been having in my life, especially with worries that things won't get better. At times I feel like I'm being held together by scotch tape. But I'm also really good at pretending I'm ok when I'm out in public. The nice thing about scotch tape is that it's invisible. She told me that I'm at the cusp of a new beginning and it's going to work, but only when I can learn to let go. She told me that I was verbally abused (two words I have never been able to say aloud about my marriage, even writing it is hard) and said it'll happen "when you can admit that it was never your fault." Like I said, at times it was almost like a counseling session.

And maybe that's all it was in the long run.  But maybe it was the counseling session I needed at that moment. I needed someone to tell me it's ok to let go of that pain and those memories. It's ok to stop blaming myself.  And it's ok to embrace what will make me happy. I need to embrace those new beginnings, instead of spending my time frightened. So whether she was a psychic or just a really good reader, I should still take those words as the gift they are and think on them.

42. If you were to die tomorrow, what would be your biggest regret? What can you do now to make sure that doesn’t happen?

I think more of my regrets are based on things I have done, rather than things I have yet to do.  I wish I'd made better decisions. I wish I'd learned more from my mistakes, instead of repeating the same patterns. I regret not taking charge of my life earlier. Focusing on crisis management put me behind on building myself up.

I know I need to be more proactive and plan better, rather than putting off the hard tasks and decisions. I need to stop giving into the grayness when it comes on me. I don't want to waste my life feeling sad. I need to find stability. I do find breaking down tasks into smaller steps helps. I've also found working out helps. It helps me get rid of a lot of anger and frustration.  So, I guess feeling better for a few hours after a good workout is still better than not at all. Maybe more refocusing will be good for me.

40. What’s the top priority in your life right now? 41. What are you doing about it?

I put these questions together because they're so connected. It just seemed easier and faster to tackle it in one post. (Maybe this is also evidence of my improved time management skills... Haha)

I think I'm in a position now where I'm viewing things less on a daily basis, less firefighting and crisis management. And now I can focus a little more on planning for longer term goals. But I also have one very important task to complete before I can completely move on to the next phase of my life and that's the divorce.

Divorce isn't easy, especially when you're dealing with so many other issues on top of it. But having the divorce finally settled should contribute to giving me some peace of mind and hopefully should also translate into smoothing out some other stresses in my life. I wish I could've been stronger to get everything finalized quicker. But I didn't, partly because I was naive and thought my ex would be more reasonable and work with me. Then when I realized that wasn't going to happen, I got caught up  in the disappointment, which spiraled into a paralysis, thinking things were never going to get better so it didn't matter how quickly the divorce was finalized. I have to stop losing sight of that better future to work towards.

So, the last few months I've been pushing through the divorce to get my goal of finalization before Christmas. I do not want to start 2015 still married. It's the last string to my old life that I need cut. And I've done everything on my end with the paperwork. It's now down to one last piece of paper my ex needs to sign, then we can finally file. After it's done, maybe I'll be a little closer to where I want to be.  So yes, the thing I've put on hold and my main priority is the exact same thing. All the more reason to get this done.

39. Are you putting any parts of your life on hold? Why?

I am. Waiting for my divorce to finalize is definitely putting my personal life on hold. It's especially frustrating because I'm at the very tail end of the process, I've done everything on my end I need to do  for finalization and all I can do is wait for my soon to be ex husband to finish his end.  As of today, it is own to one single piece of paper that he needs to sign before we can file.

At least he's finally motivated to finish the process now that he has a girlfriend, but in some ways that makes me angrier because I had to wait so long until he finally had motivation to actually do something.  I can't help wonder if dragging his feet and putting up roadblocks to the divorce for three years was his own way of punishing me for leaving. He only got on board with the process when it was convenient for him.

It's also frustrating because I want to move on in my own personal life and the stress of trying to get the divorce finalized has impacted that significantly.  It's caused roadblocks to the future I want to build.  It makes me feel less secure because I don't always trust that my future is really possible. Especially since I didn't leave under the best of circumstances and my current relationship is impacted by that. I want to break free of that past, but I often fear my current partner cannot. It hurts. Why can't it be easier to let go and move forward?

38. Who are the people who have achieved similar goals? … What can you learn from them?

So, way way way back in January I posted my list of goals for 1 year, 3 years, 5 years and 10 years.  I've been feeling pretty low over the last few weeks, so looking back and seeing that I've made some progress on my one year goal did give me a little positive twinge.  I am more secure financially.  It's still not where I want to be, but at least I'm not in the cold sweat, "How am I going to make it through each month with my bills and still eat?" territory.  I don't feel secure in a lot of other areas, though and that still bothers me.

And my issues right now are all about getting over the bad things that have happened to me, my worries that I'm just not good enough.  My worries that I can't break free of what I went through, the worries of getting hurt, the worries of not having the life, love, family and emotional security I want to have.  I still have times where I see something or hear something and it brings back some flashback and it's horrible. The stuff I went through, it stays with me.  And I feel so alone.  I don't know how other people move on from it,  because I don't even know how to find people who talk, really talk about those struggles without sounding like a bad Lifetime movie.  I don't want to read self-help or platitudes or cute Pinterest quotes over pretty backgrounds.  Things like that don't inspire me, they just depress me more because it's not really that simple.  I don't know where to find those people who can make me feel better and can teach me how to really let go in a realistic, non-treacly way.  So, if there's someone out there that can do that, please point them in my direction.

Long time... No post...

So, it's been awhile.  I've been feeling the urge to start writing things again, so I thought I should at least jump in with a quick hi.  And wow, it has been a long time! I really am going to make a more concerted effort to write more often.  I think it's good for me.  I also want to finish the 101 Questions. It was an interesting exercise and I'd like to see where it leads.

Also, I like my little version of "online therapy" that I use this blog for.  It's the one public forum I feel comfortable sharing on since I know nobody really reads it.   So, let's dive back in!  Stay tuned...