"...as makeshift as we are, we are..."

I've had this thought in my head for a while now, and I keep hoping the words to explain it are going to arrange themselves perfectly without any effort on my part, but that just hasn't happened yet. I keep forgetting that writing (like yoga) is not magic, it's work, and takes practice. So here's my practice:

One of my recurrent issues is feeling like I don't deserve anything that I have, or want. I don't deserve this relationship, that job, this house, these friends, blah blah blah. Generally this feeling only strikes when I'm down on my luck or stressed for some other reason. Like a zit before a blind date, it always comes at the worst possible moment. So I've been sitting with this realization about myself for a while; perhaps a few years since I really started to see it. Recently I've had a revelation: of course I don't deserve the things I have or want. No one deserves the hand they've been dealt, either good or bad. That's not the point. The point is that whether I deserve it or not, it's my hand and I need to play it.

A side factor that plays into this sense of not deserving, which I've lately recognized, is that I'm much more comfortable wanting something than having or working towards having it. I know this comes from growing up in an environment in which it was much, much safer to live in my head than to make my desires and needs known, but even knowing this, it remains a mindset which is dreadfully difficult to abandon.

tagged

And now, for your reading pleasure, a brief game of tag! Thanks to NoR (some of whose responses I wanted to steal/borrow).

1.Post these rules before presenting your list.
2. List 6 actions or achievements you think every person should accomplish before turning 18.
3. There are no conditions on what can be included on the list.
4. At the end of your blog, choose 6 people to get tagged and list their names.
5. People who are tagged write their own blog entry with their 6 suggestions.
6. Don’t forget to leave them a comment telling them they’re tagged.

My list:
a. Spend some time away from home. I didn't do this, but I wish I had.
b. Find the off switch for the TV (computer, iPod, xbox, &c)
c. Try something new, fail miserably, discover that failing does not kill you.
d. Start writing a journal.
e. Learn to cook and clean up after yourself.
f. Register to vote (okay, this you'd have to wait for your 18th birthday for).

I'm only tagging green weaver, who I think will have some interesting and well thought out responses.