mantisphiles

In early 2012 when I read my first article about the end of the Mayan calendar calculation predicting the end of the world, I just loved it. I am an archaeology, History Channel, conspiracy theory junkie. This was like crack, it had it all!

And then the All-Paranoid-All-the-Time TV channels started on the subject, riling up the dooms dayers into frenzies about the end of the world. There is an end of the world for all of us folks, it just ain’t gonna be that dramatic for most of us.

Shortly after reading the first article, I ran into another one. This one written by a Mayan scholar. Don’t you just love scholars? They can connect the dots between Mozart and Jon Bon Jovi and make it seem effortless, masking the years of tedious research, and publishing and waiting. The scholarly paper debunked the end of the world theory. Very easily I might add. The basis being the Mayans only knew this was the completion of their highly complex astrological calculations. And after that, a whole new era, one even they could not predict.

I loved that concept: 2013 – a whole new era. How could I make that work for me?

Coming into 2012 I had so much baggage. I dragged it through the year, sometimes getting the best of me. Other times, allowing me to break the surface.  Every time I was able to take in real air and breathe I knew more and more of what I didn’t want.  I was just having difficulty knowing what I did want.

I did want to get all, or most, of the projects done for the house.  Hoping by the end I would know whether I could remain there or not.  I did want to downsize.  I did want a means of using my skills for meaningful pursuits.  Knowing how to do all this became the problem.

By the time the majority of the house projects were done, I knew I didn’t want to stay.  Too much house, too much lot, just too much.  But I also had 25 years of a shared life residing in my basement.  All needing sorted. Months of work.  Emotional heavy lifting work.

Let Go or Be Dragged.  One of my favorite kitchen magnets.  So true in so many ways.  Outside of everything else in my life, I was being dragged.  By my job.  A career path I had fallen into to support a mutually chosen life.  A life gone, and not one I would have chosen on my own.  I had become a corporate punching bag, in the last few years becoming even more so.  Being dragged and punched and kicked at the same time.  Let Go or Be Dragged.  Time to let go.

Looking ahead to what the first quarter of 2013 will bring, a house listing in the spring, a lot of organizational work to get it there, the last few projects to complete before the sign goes up in the yard, I knew what 2013 would bring.  A chance to reconstruct my life.  To take a moment, and determine how my life will look in these remaining years.  Having prayed, soul searched, discussed what I could do, where I could go, I was no further.  Much due, I am afraid, to the constant squeeze my brain has been in just to make all it all work, survive my daily beatings.  I needed time for my brain to reboot.

Let Go or Be Dragged.  I know in my past line of work, sometimes constant work on a problem is what prevents it being solved.  Working for days on something pesky and unsolvable, becomes instantly clear once time and distance, like a day off, is taken.  How could I achieve that with my problems, my searches?  As long as my best brain time was being allocated toward the pursuits of others, my brain would not have the recharge it would need to think for me.

And so,  I have decided not to be dragged any longer.  The new era of the Mayans is a new era for me. Letting go, letting God. Not being dragged.  I am loving it.  Wish me luck folks.

Happy 2013!