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Tag Archives: Gretchen Rubin

a year of no watch

17 Friday Jul 2009

Posted by Jane Bretl in Motherhood, something important, I'm sure, Writing

≈ 8 Comments

Tags

Dustin Wax, Gretchen Rubin, procrastination, The Happiness Project, The Writer's Technology Companion, time management, watch

It is the one year anniversary of my decision to stop wearing a watch.

This would, on the surface, appear to be an illogical decision.  Those who know me personally know that I have long been habitually late.  I would joke that I arrived two weeks after my due date (true, my poor mother), and I never made up the lost time.  Actually, I became 15 minutes late around seventh grade, and maintained that 15 minutes of tardiness for the next 30 years.  It is not really a joke though — it is disrespectful to all those around me who have to wait for my idiosyncrasies to arrive where I am supposed to be.  It also does not set a very good example for my kids.  Jeez, how hard can it be to just get somewhere on time?

Without a lot of bothersome self-deprecating commentary here, I do think The Tardinesss is related to perfectionism.  I would always glance at my watch and think I must accomplish just this one more thing before I needed to ________ (insert deadline here).  A lethal mix when combined with a sketchy sense of time management and a strong propensity to procrastinate.

So, last summer, I took off my watch and vowed to change a life-long bad habit.  Without the crutch of glancing at my wrist and thinking “oh, I must do that before I go”, I had to consciously:

1)  seek out the actual time

THEN

2)  make choices for what to do next

Occasionally, if I can not find a clock (and my cell phone is once again inexplicably dead),  I will still ask strangers for the time.  Most people actually look happy to tell me, like it reminds them of a time-gone-by when people actually talked to one another and made eye contact.  To increase my chances of a pleasant encounter, I do tend to seek out those who are not texting at the time.

I spent the first weeks of this experiment continuing to look down at my wrist only to see it was a hair past a freckle.  But somewhere along the way I found (some of) my lost 15 minutes.  I am now only occasionally late, sometimes ON TIME, and a few times I have shocked people by being early.  It feels good.  It is a time-management work in progress.

I recently found a great article with some tips on how to be on time.  Author Dustin Wax shares “10 Ways to Make Yourself More Punctual“.  I am going to incorporate more of these nifty tricks into my routine.  Just FYI, Dustin is also the author of a useful blog The Writer’s Technology Companion.

And, of course, I need to be remember not to let the pendulum swing too far to the other side.  As usual, Gretchen Rubin at the Happiness Project provides excellent perspective, this time for not being too rigid about being on time.  She has the opposite problem of never being tardy, but her advice still brings balance to my quest.

So, not sporting a watch is working for me.  After wearing one for 30 years, its conspicuous absence is like a string tied around my finger, except with less blood flow restriction.  I still have my cuckoo clock, but that does not count, not just because I do not wear it on my wrist, but because it does not actually keep time.  It just keeps ticking, which keeps me clicking (on the keys…)

Now if only I could mail cards to arrive on (or before) the desired date… hhhmmmm, maybe it is that crutch, the calendar…?

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friends, revisited

29 Monday Jun 2009

Posted by Jane Bretl in seasons

≈ 6 Comments

Tags

Ed and Deb Shapiro, friendship, Gretchen Rubin, Huffington Post, The Happiness Project, Zebra Sounds

A while back I wrote about friendships — how hard it is to leave them behind when we move and how challenging to keep the friendship alive as the years pass.

Shortly after, I saw a tweet from Gretchen Rubin, author of The Happiness Project blog,

half of all friends are replaced every seven years

Really, half every seven years?  The seven year itch of friendships?  Then I read this piece on Zebra Sounds , with a link to an excellent HuffPo articleby Ed and Deb Shapiro.  Technically, it’s about Monica Lewinsky, a dinner party, and forgiveness, but here is a quote that grabbed my attention (along with a note to self to go back and  re-read the inspirational ‘forgive yourself” advice…)

“Within the space of seven years every cell in our body dies and is reformed, our thoughts are constantly changing and our feelings come and go. We are literally not the same person we were a minute ago, let alone a day, a month or a year ago”.

Given the science and the sociology, it seems somewhat amazing that we can maintain friendships at all, with all the changes in our every day lives.   This is our transitory reality, not just when we move out of town, but every move we make, every day, changing us little by little. 

Good thing friendship is not based on science.

If I had any lingering doubt about the lasting nature of friendships, this last week was proof positive.  We saw friends that we had not seen in 10-15 years, and although apparently every cell in my body had changed over twice (and doubled?), it was like a week had gone by, and we had hatched tween children and (just a few) wrinkles in the meantime, but otherwise it was comfortable as an old glove.  Not that they are old.  And neither are we.  Just an expression, really.

I call them old friends in the most attractive, affectionate, slimming, firm, and endearing way possible, seven times over.

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put on a happy face

30 Monday Mar 2009

Posted by Jane Bretl in Motherhood, Writing

≈ 5 Comments

Tags

Gretchen Rubin, happy face, Mondays, The Happiness Project, Zebra Sounds

Happy Monday, folks!  I’ve put away the crowbar for another week — there’s nothing like getting a couple growing boys out of bed on a Monday morning to give those biceps a good workout with garden tools.

No one was smiling this morning.  Well, except me.

See, Monday morning now means a quiet house where I can just write.  Writing gets me out of bed.  Writing gives me energy.  So does reading great writing.

And coffee!  Coffee is really good too.

Finding happiness on a Monday, or any other day, is the basis for the wonderful blog  The Happiness Project.  (Yes, yet another great link found on Zebra Sounds!)  On The Happiness Project, author Gretchen Rubin shares her “adventures and insights as I grapple with the challenge of being happier”.  In one poignant post, she shares the paradoxes of happiness;  just one thing learned during her year-long journey of test-driving every happiness theory she could find.  Good reading!

To me, the true paradox of happiness is its unexpected painfulness.  A broken heart hurts like hell, but happiness/beauty can also pierce the heart with its sweetness.  When I look at my children, I feel so blessed and happy and lucky that it hurts.  The heart aches when sad things happen, but it can also ache with joy.

An alternative is to go through life slightly oblivious to all the intense beauty around us, keeping busy and on task to keep the mind and the heart from feeling too much.  A conscious or unconscious decision.  Plenty of fun and happy and laughs and pleasantness, just not the joy so sharp,  it cuts.

Happiness brings tears to my eyes nearly every day.  Is it a fear that all that makes me happy in this place could be ephemeral?  The knowledge that in this crazy world, anything can happen, any day?  Maybe happiness and sadness are separated by a very thin line, and the heart feels them both as one.  Either way, I cry at inopportune times, but that is me.

my happiness projectAll I have to do is look at those sweet sons of ours in the morning, before they are awake, and breathe deeply in their sleepy necks to wake them up.  It feels like as much happiness as I deserve all day.

Of course, the sleepyheads are so much cuter before they start moaning about the need to get up.  The onset of puberty might also change my tune.  We’ll see.

If all else fails to stir the happiness in my soul, there is always the option of putting on a happy face, even on the days when life’s blessings are less obvious.  Gretchen says it is possible.

The Little One has discovered that a paper plate works in a pinch.

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jane, candid

In 2009, I started this blog to share my sometimes thoughtful, sometimes funny, occasionally irreverent thoughts on motherhood, writing for publication and myriad creatures that got along as cats and dogs.

One day, I felt like stepping away from living out loud for awhile. Eh, life happens.

Fast forward five years -- I'll gloss over the details for now -- save to say that lucky for me an unexpected detour has provided some new material.

So here I am, standing at the corner. I've been here before, wondering which way to go. This time I choose living.

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