May is the time for a Mindful Bee

RUN None, I skipped my planned 16 miler this past weekend

Monday: COMMUTE on Liberty route, ELLIPTICAL 20 mins, and STRENGTH 15-20 mins

I wrote a letter to myself yesterday, as suggested by a therapist (not mine) as a way to let go of the longing to be your former past self. Say goodbye in a letter, and let it go. Well, it was more complex than that, than "write a letter", but you get the idea. 

I had a hard time writing it. And about 10 pages later, I still didn't come to the answers I'd hoped to find. I wrote it yesterday while at home, after doing a full-on meal prep and waiting for someone to buy the couch and waiting for the smoker to finish the meat. 

My "run early" turned into a wait, and when I wait - I delay. I wanted to do a fast - didn't. I ended up feeling nauseated and "hungry" at 8 or 9 am, and thought if I just ate a little I'd feel better. Do I just image all those feelings, as a trick to eat and not delay?

Then after eating beef and chicken and peanut butter, I decided to start the cook up since I had to wait for the smoker to finish the meat. LA suggested another hour or two to finish it, but no it took longer and I got the impression that I shouldn't just leave it for hours while I run. So I waited. 

Take note, as I just did, that I delay on somethings and wait on others. Pattern?

Then I was hovering over my phone because a neighbor was supposed to pick up the couch, another a drill, and we're waiting to hear back on some bookshelves. So slow, no answers, yet I hovered and waited.  

So I cooked. And kept munching, and every bite of PB I knew it "wouldn't set well to run with this", and I told myself that "I'll stop eating now and run at noon, because it's only 10am now". 

Then couch guy wants to come at 1pm. He doesn't. He's coming at 3pm. There's some stress for me, because there's two neighbors trying to come at 3pm. I wait. I finish the cook up and clean up. I clean the garage. By this point, I realize I'm not going to run. 

And it's like a weight is lifted. 

I'm not going to run. And the weight is lifted.

So I have to step back here and wonder why that is. I'll get back to that. For now, the letter. I was planning on saying goodbye to IronBee me and saying "hey it was great but I gotta move on" when I realized I wasn't ready to move on. The summary of the letter was "I miss you" and "we still have a (M)utal friend in common and I don't know who I am right now".

I tried to work it out - who am I? I'm not IronBee, or BreakawayBee, or BornAgainBee. BadAssBee? It didn't fit. LA suggested QueenBee, but that doesn't fit right now either. 

Almost 10 pages - and while thinking about what would make me happy (couldn't think of anything) and what do I want (I dunno) and what do I want to become (don't know that either) I came up with the idea that I needed small challenges to work on. Not 0 to 100 miles, not an overhaul of who I am. But rather, like the ring the IronBee used to wear that said "A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step", I needed to find that single step. 

And I realized - I'm not mindful. I'm stuck in the past. I'm anxious about the future. LA has noticed this, and it even came up Saturday in a mini-fight I started over the Brazilian drink outcome. 

So, I proposed: Mindful Bee. Moving from Mindfull to Mindful, like in the dog cartoon. And I picked 5 M things to get mindful about:
1. Mornings - get up, hit the goals, see some sunshine. Don't lose this golden time
2. Meetings - quit multitasking when other people talk to you and listen
3. Meals - put down the phone and pay attention, stop the distraction
4. Monster - jeezus it's almost 50 days and he's knocking on the door again
5. Moria - just get the fuck out of there

It's easier to remember that way, with M names. So that's my goal for May: Get Mindful. This idea crossed my mind a few weeks ago, and it circled back, and I took it.