Week 9 - 49 years 2 months

​Welcome to Part 2 of my 3 part series entitled Lessons for My Kids. We’re continuing on with 5 more life lessons that have absolutely affected my life for the better. If you missed part 1, you can find it here. Let’s jump right in, shall we?

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​6. “Everything is Figureoutable” Marie Forleo said it best. In fact she has a book titled, you guessed it, “Everything is Figureoutable'', which you can check out here if you’re curious. I haven’t read it yet, but I plan to. Actually, I believe it was her mom who first said it to her. And when I tell you no truer words have been spoken, I sincerely mean it. Everything is figureoutable.

I am very well aware that it sometimes doesn’t seem that way. I have had more than my fair share of moments, days, weeks even, where I felt like nothing would work in my favor. And honestly, I occasionally still do. But the truth is, I’m here. I’m alive. And that’s more than a lot of people can say. As long as I’m alive, there’s a next step. And when I’m dead, I won’t care.

When I used to work with families coaching them on how to navigate the special education system, I was constantly reminding them that their child’s Individual Education Plan (IEP) was a living document, meaning it was changeable and there was always a next step. I found that families, understandably, would get worried that the IEP as it was written, wouldn’t help their child sufficiently. Part of my job was to help them understand the myriad ways that we could proceed if things weren’t going according to plan, and that the IEP was a jumping off point. It was a place to start, and we would pivot as often as necessary. I would tell them, “There’s always a Next Step”. And there was.

I talked about the importance of planning to pivot last week in this blog. And I realize that some of my lessons overlap each other, which I find kind of cool. It’s symbolic of how everything in life is intertwined and connected. To me, this means that wherever you are there’s somewhere to go. And I find that reassuring, like another way to say “everything is figureoutable”. Because it is.

No matter what circumstances look or feel like at any given moment, there’s always a next step. You may not be able to discern it because your mind is so busy being stuck in the problem, but that doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist.

The solution cannot exist in the same thoughts as the problem. You need to let go of thinking about your problem in order to find thoughts that could lead to a solution.

This is the same phenomenon that occurs when you lose your glasses, turn your whole house upside down looking for them, dump your purse out to find not your glasses but your favorite pen that you thought your kid stole and lost at school, decide you must have left them on the roof of your car when you left Home Depot, give up the search, buy new glasses, and then find them a week later in the very same purse you dumped out that you were absolutely certain they were not in.

If you believe your glasses are lost then inherently they are un-findable, right? Lost is pretty final, isn’t it? When my grandma used to tell people that my mom died, she would say “We lost Susan a while back.” Lost means gone.

If your thoughts are focused on “lost” glasses, you will not find them. You will only be able to find them when you shift your attention/focus off the “lost” part, and allow some sliver of possibility for moving forward. In the case of the missing glasses you buy new ones and then you find the old ones, because when you bought new glasses you stopped thinking about the “lost” ones.

Sidebar: I try to use the word “misplaced” rather than “lost”. It helps my brain stay open to allowing the solution to come forward. If something is misplaced, it can be found.

The same is true for finding solutions to problems. As long as you believe a problem is unsolvable, insurmountable, impossible, overwhelming, or too much, you will not find the solution. How could you? If a problem is unsolvable there is inherently no solution to find, is there?

But everything is figureoutable.

Hold fast to the belief that you can figure out anything, that there’s always a next step, that things will work out for the best, even when you can’t see the solution right away, and eventually the solution will come.

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7. The ripple effect is strong. Sometimes referred to as the butterfly effect. When you become the change you wish to see, you will instantly impact the world in a positive way. And you may not see your impact, but that’s ok. You don’t need to see your effect. That’s not your business. Live in line with your values, be the change, and trust the process. Your happy heart will have an exponentially larger impact than anything else you could possibly do.

I think it’s really easy to get to a point where we feel like our efforts are all for naught. This applies as much to trying to teach our children our values, as it does to making a positive impact in the world. We all want to feel useful. We all want to feel that we’re making a difference, whether it’s in our own family or across the globe. There’s nothing wrong with that.

The rub comes when we have our own narrow ideas of what it means to make a difference. Most of us think that if we can’t see the difference we’re making right away, we’re not making it. And that’s rubbish. What’s more, it misses the point.

Do the things that you know to do to make a difference, and trust that the difference is made. That’s it. Let the doing of the things be the reward and the source of your satisfaction, not the witnessing of the results. That’s not your business.

Live according to the values and principles that matter to you, and the ripples will spread far beyond what your human mind can perceive. You will be a beacon for others to move towards, an example of the brilliance that is possible in an otherwise devastating world.

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8. Prioritize things based on the mental load they carry, not how easy they are or how long they’ll take or how efficiently you can get them done, or any other such tomfoolery. This is an expert level life hack. It’s especially important during times of overwhelm, but also works brilliantly outside of overwhelm.

It has taken me a very long time, but I have learned beyond a doubt that nothing takes me down the rabbit hole of despair or exhausts me more than carrying a heavy mental load longer than I absolutely need to.

The effect of mental load should never be underestimated. It’s a burden greater than any other. You can find the heaviest mental loads hiding behind shame and guilt and “shoulds” and “have to’s”. When appropriate, schedule heavy mental load tasks by themself. Don’t stack them with other errands and things to do. Give yourself an entire day to accomplish the task and then chill, if need be.

My therapist will sometimes tell me to reach for the low hanging fruit when I’m overwhelmed, which is contradictory to what I’m saying here. So let me clarify. By the time she has to tell me to reach for the low hanging fruit, I’ve already broken down crying, argued vehemently in favor of my limiting beliefs, offered a problem for every solution she suggests, and basically stopped functioning as a human.

And she’s right. At that point in my mess, I’m too far gone to prioritize the heavy mental load. I no longer have the brain capacity to execute on the thing that will free up the most bandwidth in my brain. My executive function skills have gone the way of the 8 track cassette - obsolete unless you’re a vintage collector of unusable shit.

The idea is to prioritize and take care of the heaviest mental load task first, early in the overwhelm, so that you don’t get into the “beyond overwhelmed and shutting down” phase. At that point the only thing that helps is a pint of coconut gelato, a day in bed, and a Gilmore Girls binge session. Sometimes that is the only low hanging fruit I can reach.

I think a lot of my struggle to manage tasks and prioritize things is due to ADHD, so maybe this doesn't apply to everyone. But if you can relate, I highly suggest trying to get the heavy mental load shit out of the way, making it top priority. It’s such a relief to know it’s done.

Sidebar from The edge of 50: Do not underestimate the impact of ADHD and challenges with executive function on daily life. Having ADHD is like being a fish, trying to ride a bicycle, believing you’re a complete waste of scales and gills because you keep falling off, all the while failing to notice that even though you don’t have legs or hands you’ve already ridden 1,000 miles. But ADHD is an explanation for certain struggles, not an excuse to give up. Rather, it can be permission to go easier on yourself when things feel hard.

And also, you don’t need to have ADHD to go easier on yourself. I’m 100% certain everyone reading this is too hard on themself.

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9. Remember that you are always your worst critic. Let that knowledge be a filter for your inner dialogue. Give yourself a break. Remember that you are better than you’re giving yourself credit for.

This knowledge somehow seems to seep into the deep, dark, crevices of my mind at precisely the time I need it to be as big and obvious as the Snoopy balloon in the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade.

It’s easy to forget. It’s easy to doubt. It’s easy to believe the negative self-talk that says “What the fuck is wrong with you? You know better than this. You knew this would happen. You should have done -fill in the blank- and this never would have happened.” And on and on it goes.

It is precisely these moments when we need to dig deep into our tool kit of values and beliefs, and remember that we do not have to believe everything we think. And here’s a secret: the criticism and judgment that we spew to ourselves in our low moments is not ours. It’s actually crap we picked up along the way. They are not our words. We would never talk to ourselves that way. Those criticisms come from somewhere or someone else. We are free to ignore them. I invite you to do so liberally, and with gusto.

We need to be willing to challenge the criticism and negativity that flows through our minds if we are ever to be able to move forward and do the things we want to do in life. Don’t let others’ fears and doubts become your inner voice.

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10. It is what you believe it is. I know the common adage is “It is what it is,” but I’m telling you it’s not. The importance of this lesson lies in the nuance. I like “it is what it is” because it can help stop us from trying to change circumstances that are so far into their creation that we cannot change them.

But there’s more to it than that, of course, because what we believe about a situation or circumstance is ultimately what we’ll experience relative to that situation or circumstance.

If I’m running late for a job interview and I get a flat tire, I could find myself believing that getting a flat tire is the worst thing that could happen to me at that moment. I’ll be late. They’ll think I’m irresponsible. I’ll never get the job. I won’t be able to afford my bills. My whole world will collapse.

Alternatively, I could find myself believing that although it’s an inconvenience, it will be alright. Everything is working out in my favor regardless of how it seems on the surface. I don’t need to panic. I’ll just take the actions that I’m able to take right now and keep going.

Alternatively to that, I could believe that getting a flat tire is a blessing among blessings - even if I don’t know what the blessing is. I could choose to believe that it’s a blessing and allow my thoughts and actions to proceed accordingly. I could approach it with curiosity and wonder what it’s in for me, trusting all the while that if I can manage to keep the faith and believe in the blessing that eventually it will be revealed to me.

Every single solitary situation is both a blessing and a curse. A springboard and an obstacle. A stepping stone and a locked gate.

How each situation presents itself to you, how you perceive each situation is wholly dependent on what you allow yourself to believe about it. Sometimes, we’re so far into the shit, that it feels impossible to find calm in the storm. In these cases the best we can do is find a port to wait out the storm. And that’s ok. That's the best we can do, and that’s perfect. When that happens, it’s because there’s some sort of blessing or opportunity for us in experiencing the storm. And we can feel satisfied with remembering that.

When the shitty situations come, try to approach them with curiosity and see if you can shift your perception, little by little, enough so that you can believe there is a blessing until you can actually see the blessing.

This takes a lifetime of practice. There’s no quick formula or shortcut. It’s about awareness, acceptance, action, and appreciation. It’s more of a twisty, winding, occasionally backtracking path than a straight line. And you’ll often find yourself feeling like you’re back where you started, or in the same dreaded situation that you were in before, multiple times.

When this happens, you’ll want to stab yourself in the eye, or some other similarly ridiculous, self flagellation type activity. You’ll tell your therapist shit like “I can’t do this anymore. I can’t try so hard just to be in the same place that I was last year.” Or you’ll cry to your sister in her bedroom a week before Christmas because she offers you her JC Penny card to get your kids some gifts because she knows you need help, even though you didn’t ask. You’ll tell her how sick you are of struggling and never making any progress.

Or maybe that’s just me. Regardless...

What you need to try to remember in these times is that you’re actually not in the same place because you have the knowledge and experience you gained the last time around. And the fact that you feel like you’re in the same place you were before is just data letting you know that you’ve created something for yourself (in collaboration with the universe) that your current beliefs aren’t letting you receive.

Work on believing that you get to have what you want, and you’ll be in a position to receive it. After all, it’s your creation. Why shouldn't you receive it?

Believing that the life you want is possible for you, is the single most powerful thing you can do to support your own dreams and desires. It’s not the only thing required, but it is the most powerful and potent thing you can do. Your belief will waver, and that’s part of the process. Your job is to return to that belief, no matter what. No matter how many times it takes. No matter how many times you have to pivot. Believe in yourself, and the rest of the world will catch up.

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Blessings and beach days forever,

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Katie