At an event a couple of weeks ago, I heard a young woman sing a lyric that sounded like, “I’m always on my mind.” (The event was honoring my brother-in-law for a lifetime achievement award, so congrats to him!) It was an amazing performance of an original song and I’m pretty sure I misheard the words, but that phrase stuck with me anyway. “I’m always on my mind” as in “I’m always in my head.” And I realized that that’s a place where I spend a lot of time lately. And not in a musical, lyrical way.
One of the reasons is because we’ve had so much going on in our little family these last several years. Argue with me if you will, but sometimes I think God does give us more than we can handle. Just when I come up for air--BAM--the next thing is staring me down. This may just be the way life is, or it is a particular quirk of our family, but here we are. And I’m constantly on my mind, trying to remember the next thing to do, wondering if I did that last thing right, trying to stuff the negative thoughts into some dark corner and focusing on the positive bright lights in my life. Of which there are many.
But speaking of arguments--and I know they’re coming, so please keep reading--I have gotten pretty good at them. Some of the best arguments I’ve had--and dare I say that I’ve won--have been with people who aren’t even in the room. They are all in my head. Of course many of them are with Angelo and he probably has no idea how adept I’ve become at dismantling his positions, but I have others with people who need a lesson in civility or responsibility. Or science. There was a time when I could spend hours imagining myself winning at putting someone right back in their place. Ha! They won’t mess with me again! There were countless times I practically broke my arm patting myself on the back for all the contests I won. Now when this happens, I remind myself not to waste precious time and energy engaging in conversations with people who aren’t there. To be honest, they don’t even really appreciate my skill, so it’s just as well.
Some of the time I spend in my head is just trying to stay centered on the things I actually have in front of me; my family, my work, my community obligations. If God doesn’t know when to stop ladling more challenges onto our plates, then we have to be the ones to draw some limits ourselves. And be okay with that. This also requires speaking up and for me, this too requires some rehearsal in my head. “No, I don’t think I can do that thing I already said I’d do, but gives me hives whenever I think about having to do it anymore. Sorry.” My rule of thumb for quitting something to which I’ve already agreed is to determine if there is a feeling of relief. Relief has always been my metric for doing the right thing. There still might be a little tug of guilt, a sting of chagrin, but once relief sets in, I can feel good about my decision.
This is not to (hopefully) say that I’m going around picking fights and quitting all my jobs and commitments. Of course not. I’m not what anyone would call confrontational, but as I’ve gotten older, I have gotten better at sticking up for myself. I can stick up for others, too, when I feel someone has been unreasonably insulting or out of line. It’s not that often and I don’t go looking for it, but I’ve gotten to the point where if I have to speak up, I will.
It’s probably because of all that practice.
As always, wonderfully expressed twists and turns of your MIND! ❤️