Try And Then Stop

For DOCUMENTED LIFE this week, the prompt was "Arrows" and here's what I came up with:

"See the past, but look ahead."

I think the combination of the two pages is...not my best work.  (Insert frowning face here.)

But if you look at them as individual pages, they're not quite as terrible.

And I do enjoy the sentiment...so I guess I won't gesso them over and start again.  Not every page has to be good, right?  It would be so boring to be perfect...thank goodness I'll always have something to work on.

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For REVERB14, today's prompt is:

In 2015, is there something you'd like to try harder at because you believe it would make all the difference?  Conversely, what is something you could stop trying so hard at that might actually help you manifest what you'd like?

I think the right answer to this question...or at least the honest one...is I'd like to try harder at everything.  Or even, just try.

In my adult life, I have managed to give up on a lot of things that should be important.

In many ways, I live in a sort of survival mode.  What I mean is that I do the things I have to do to get by day to day.  I go to work.  I eat.  I sleep.  I do the bare minimum of housework so as not to catch scurvy or some other terrible disease.  I survive, but I don't thrive.  I'm not dead, but I'm not really living.

I wasn't always like this...I used to be a fighter.  Don't get me wrong, I still do, on occasion, fight for what I want to happen...but not often.  Mostly what I've been doing is taking things lying down.

It started, I think, under the idea of compromise.  I had this naive notion that if I would let something happen someone else's way, then it would be my turn and something would be done my way.  But that's not what ended up happening.  Instead, in order to avoid an argument, I just kept letting the other person decide how things would be done.  

Compromise only works if two people are willing to do it...otherwise, it's just one person getting steamrolled.  After a while, it gets to the point where not only do you not get your way, but where your ideas are stupid...laughable even.  Over time, you just give up completely.

 Eventually, I stopped putting any effort into anything.  Call it passive resistance, I guess.  

If you don't shut up about your views on what I cook for dinner, I stop cooking.  If you don't appreciate the fact that I do the laundry, do your own.  If you're going to dirty the house I just spent hours cleaning, I'll stop cleaning.  The list goes on.

But I hate the way things are now.  I'm ashamed I've let it get this far.  Not only for the physical aspects, like living in a filthy and disorganized house, but more for the overall attitude of disinterest I've had for so long...for allowing myself to be bullied into a corner.

The thing is I know me.  If I don't do something drastic, it will only continue this way forever.  

In 2015, the thing I need to stop trying so hard at is believing other people will change. ..that they will  quit being selfish and suddenly show consideration for me.  Logically, if it hasn't happened yet, then it's not going to happen.

Metaphorically, I'm way past the point of cleaning house.  The only solution now is to burn it down and walk away.  

I've held off for a long time because I thought things would change...that if I was different, it would motivate other people to be different too.  But that's not happening.  And at this point, to be perfectly honest, even if there was any sincere effort, it would be too little, too late.  I wouldn't believe it would be a lasting change.  Like so many times in the past, it would be a temporary fix to shut me up...and then, when I calmed down, things would go right back to the way they were. That's happened too many times to count, and I'm done.  I'm so done.

In 2015, I am going to calmly strike the match and walk away.  And then, I will work hard to build something new for myself...something I can be proud of...something worth fighting for.