Being complete with what is incomplete

Or, Why I completed NaNowriMo and nothing else.

I’ve been thinking about this post for a while. My experience of the last 3 months is one of being incomplete with everything  during the year. I started things that I never finished. I formed ideas in my mind that didn’t even made the lists. Those lists I never wrote anyway. My mind could not manage more than two projects at a time. A bit disconcerting when I used to manage 10 to 15 projects, plus the schedule for 3 kids…

In January I quit my job, releasing 15 years of stress. I loved my job, I loved what I did and accomplished, but the stress of raising a family alone was exhausting. My kids are now adult, I still keep an eye but now I don’t have the same responsabilities. At their age I was raising 3 kids, I guess they can manage themselves. 😉

The past week has been one of completing the incomplete, and being ok with where I’m at now. Going through the process I was aware that I didn’t want to manage all that I used to do, or not at the same pace. I yearned for moments of slowness in everything. Take time to reflect on ideas, to deepen them. Well that capacity I haven’t lost. My mind can fire ideas at will, non-stop, even when I sleep…

I wished I had the energy to do everything. That my energy would have come back sooner. Well that didn’t happen.

Then, NaNoWriMo. I might have quit right after the first week, and again in the middle of the third one. And because I didn’t want to fail  another thing in my life this year (that’s what I thought at the time), I woke up the last two days and burned my brain literally, and my fingers and emptied the bottomless pit of crazy ideas my mind can thing of. In the morning of November 30th I had 32121 words. Who in their right mind would write 18K words in a day?

Finishing seemed to washed away all the feelings of unworthiness and doubts that kept creeping in the back of my mind.

Why I finished NaNoWriMo? Because, if I could master failing at everything else in my life, I would not fail at writing. The only thing that didn’t involve anything else. Just me sitting alone and writing. I chose to do that.

I have a long list of things I didn’t complete or think they should have been different. All assumptions I made about things I want; expectations I had about myself and what I could accomplish.

But to every single thing I think I failed, I have ten things that gave me joy.

• My kids succeeding and taking on their adult life.
• New friendships that openned new insights and possibilities.
• Old friendships that deepened and nurtured my soul.
• Happy, funny and joyful moments with my family.
• Many, many trips in new places filled with moments of bliss.

And more.

Thank you for all the experiences and how they went. It’s all perfect.

With great respect!

A.