Friday, April 25, 2008

forgive me (proverbial) Father, for I have lost... my motivation

Dear (proverbial, because I'm not religious) Father,

Father, forgive me, for I have lost my motivation. At least I think I have. I feel I have...

I am currently "between jobs" as my too kind and supremely diplomatic friend put it, after I told her that I am an unemployed dirtbag. In truth, I have been "between jobs" for about four months now. Granted, I have been dealing with health problems and waiting on a contract that keeps getting pushed back, but still, that does not stop me from feeling like a giant sack of shite every day. (My health problems are of the "physical" variety this time around, as opposed to the "mental" variety... as if that distinction should actually exist in our day and age, so please don't worry too much, dear readers!)

My partner saunters off to work every morning. And I bury myself deeper into my blankets, thankful for one or two more hours of sleep, dreading that I have to wake up and find things to occupy myself with that day.

Four months ago, finding things to do was easy, since me and my SO had recently moved into a new apartment. I occupied my days with painting, arranging furniture, cleaning, and organizing, while simultaneously trying to manage my health problems. He went to work. It was a great formula because we were both contributing to building our new life, just in different ways.

All of that is done now. There are no more changes to be made to the apartment. There is not one curtain left to hang, or one measly door to paint. He goes off to work. I wake up to another day... another day of feeling like a dirtbag.

So I sit, every morning, on my couch, and wonder, what the hell am I going to do with myself today? And I think; I feel like a sack of poop. I feel like all I do is cook, clean, and waste a lot of valuable time that should be spent working and earning an income.

The other day I visited my too kind and disgustingly diplomatic friend. We had a chat about what we were up to recently. I actually haven't seen her since I moved into the new place four months ago.

I told her how I haven't really done much in the months I've been at the new place. But I told her about the work I've done on the apartment. The furniture I've refinished, the rooms I've painted, the shopping I've done to get the place looking somewhat livable. I chatted about the gardening I've done, and the more that I plan to do. I told her about the meetings I've attended in order to "harvest" the job that I'm waiting on in the hopes that it will open up soon. I told her about the book I'm trying to write. How I sit for about four hours a day, three or four days a week, tap tapping on my digital computing machine (erm, my craptop). I told her that I'm averaging about two pages a day during those sessions. I talked about this blog that I've started. I talked about the books that I've read. I talked about the pets that I feed and give love to every day. I talked about all the baking I've done since I've moved in and so on.

At the end of our chatting, she interjected, "Wow, you sound pretty busy!"

I looked at her in total disbelief. I was shocked that she had said that; totally and speechlessly shocked in fact.

Here I've been beating myself up for being "unmotivated," and my friend, my blessed, wonderful, generous friend, in one simple sentence totally put my life into perspective (at least, the last four months of my life, anyway).

I guess it's all a matter of how we look at things, huh? And it's possible, that my goggles are a little screwed up or something, given all the hangups I have about wanting to be a "contributer" not a "consumer." How else do you explain why I've been castigating myself for the last three months?

Here's to waiting one more week for that mythological job to open up... and here's to one more week of "doing nothing!"

The busiest, yet most unmotivated, girl on this side of the pond,
O.

PS. If you don't know what the word "consumer" is, here is an explanation: Consumer is what the mental health professionals call people who have mental illness. People with problems of mental health are called "consumers" because historically people with mental illness have been dependent on health care and social services... Their logic in using this term is that people with mental illness "consume" social services in the same way that people with money voraciously consume products on the market.

This is a dangerous term because in the word "consumer" is implied that people who require the help of health care professionals and social services don't give back to their communities. It is implied, by using this word, that people with problems of mental health only take from their communities. Examples of giving back include volunteerism, using experiential knowledge and skills in the workplace or to help peers, contributing to the community and social services through paying taxes, and so on.

PPS. I LOATHE the term consumer.

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