The Next Batch of Marbles

Drink more water (plop). Drink less wine (plop). Do Yoga and posture exercises every morning (plop). Ice my neck at bedtime (plop). Take a sleeping pill every night (plop). One more batch of marbles on my way toward a better life (slide).

I met with my MD today. After MONTHS of not sleeping well at all, I finally got desperate enough to make an appointment, actually show up, and say, “Dr. Suze, I need medication to make me sleep at night.” A radical measure for me to say the least, as I am VERY reluctant to take ANY kind of medication if it can be avoided. But, I’ve tried EVERYTHING ever suggested by ANYONE, and I’m still not sleeping at night. I’m exercising, I’m taking my vitamins, I’m doing relaxation exercises, I’m taking hot baths, I’m taking Melatonin and/or a natural sleep aid, and it’s just not doin’ the trick. On a GOOD night, I’m getting 4-5 hours of restful sleep, and am wakeful the rest of the night. On a BAD night, I’m getting 1-2 hours at a time, with long stretches of wakefulness in between. As any layman can tell you, sleep deprivation is really Bad Juju for anyone, and if left unchecked can lead to an individual who is really grumpy at best, somewhat unstable on average, or flat-out psychotic at worst. If memory serves, it’s been about eleven years since I’ve had a normal sleep cycle on a regular basis. So, it’s kinda time I started sleeping.

So, Doc Suze recommended an OTC sleep aid to try for a few nights. The one I already tried only worked on the first night then fizzled, so I’m not terribly enthusiastic about OTC’s. But, what the heck, I’ll give it a shot. If that doesn’t work, she gave me an Rx for some “real” stuff to try. “It may take a couple of weeks of taking it every night before we know whether or not it’s going to work for you”. Peachy. I’ve procrastinated on this to the point I don’t have much patience left with the issue, but I’ll have to just deal with it. One more step toward a normal sleep life. Right?

The other stuff, well, it’s pretty much self-explanatory. Except maybe the ice part. That’s something my chiropractor is reminding me I need to do every night, since I’ve got stress-and-alignment issues in my neck. So, I’ve stuck a sticky-note on my mirror that says “ICE”, so I remember to go fetch the icepack after I brush my teeth and take my vitamins at bedtime.

I seem to have turned into a project. Can't wait to see how it turns out...

Rolling Marbles and Sliding Tiles, Part Three

But, Sliding Tiles is not just about moving furniture around and helping our home to fulfill a natural balance. Our lives, particularly our family life, is very much like the sliding tile game, with particular elements being arranged and rearranged, each slide of a tile creating a new picture of our lives. Sometimes this picture looks very much like a work in progress, making little sense, a state of temporary chaos on the way toward the creation of a more balanced and harmonious vision. And, once that harmonious state is reached, well, a new element is added, the surface adjusts to accommodate the addition, and the sliding of tiles begins again to create a new picture, fulfill a new vision.

Each marble that plops through the hole becomes a new tile to slide. Each new habit we inject into our lives impacts other aspects of our lives. It takes an adjustment, a little rearrangement, a little moving things around until the new picture emerges, almost of its own accord. And, suddenly, WE have changed. Our lives have made a small evolution toward our ultimate vision.

I post each day to my grandmother’s poetry blog (plop); and I gain a deeper understanding, appreciation and love for her and for whence I came (slide). I take my vitamins every day (plop); and I have more energy and emotional balance and mental clarity to commit to my life and my family (slide). I carve out an hour to walk or exercise each day (plop); and am afforded quiet, reflective time to pull together my thoughts enough to write them down coherently (slide), eventually slim down to a natural weight (slide), and ultimate live a life that is long, healthy and full of vitality (slide).

It can also work the other way ‘round. We make changes to our environment which will help support the establishment of a new habit. Dedicating one room or one corner of a room to an instrument or two and filling your home with music to entice the habit of playing regularly. Placing a beautiful antique desk, or a comfy overstuffed chair, or a fully stocked easel near a sunny window to encourage the habit of sitting down to write, or sitting down to read, or sitting down to draw. Creating a dedicated and comfortable personal study space for yourself and for each student to encourage daily study.

Our lives are in a constant state of change. Some change we seek out, and some change is thrust upon us. A child is diagnosed with a life-threatening chronic illness. Our spouse is called away on business more often than we feel we can manage. A relative needs some extra assistance to get through a rough patch. As much as we may like routine, and planning, and scheduling because it gives us a sense of being in control of life, the fact is there is always some new marble plopping and transforming into a tile, whether it’s us doing the plopping or the Universe. It’s up to us to just keep slidin’ those tiles to create the new picture. We can either slide tiles strictly to accommodate the Universe’s plopping and see what the picture turns out to be, or we can work on plopping our own marbles to add into the mix, and lend a part of ourselves and our own vision to the creation process. That, in my humble opinion, is about as much “control” as we really have in our lives.

Rolling Marbles and Sliding Tiles, Part One

As Mimi and I were walking together recently on one of our infrequent but treasured “us getting healthy” walks in the park, I was rambling on about the list of new habits I’ve been instituting, and ever so slightly whining that my new chiropractor seems intent on adding to the list. I said (with appropriate nasal accent), “If I try to add one more new habit right now, all my marbles are going to start rolling off my plate.”

I’ve decided that new habits are kind of like that WiiFit game you play on the balance board where there’s a semi-flat surface suspended in space with a marble on it, and you have to maneuver the marble across the surface and drop it into a hole by shifting your weight on the balance board. Like injecting a new habit into the larger context of your life, you have to focus enough attention on the marble you’re maneuvering, while at the same time remaining aware of the surface itself. Once you plop the marble into the hole, you don’t have to worry about it anymore, because it’s pretty much been incorporated into your universe.

But, the thing about this game is, each time you get the marble in the hole, a new surface appears in space, and one more marble is added. Now, you’ve got two marbles to maneuver on a slightly different surface, two marbles you’ve got to plop into the hole or holes. While you’re working on marble #1, you’ve got to be aware enough of marble #2 that you don’t let it fall off the edge of the surface and into oblivion. And, of course, once you’ve mastered two marbles, then there are three marbles, and a different surface. Then four marbles. Then five. Then six. You get the picture. Starting to sound like your life? It sure sounds like mine. Only thing is, I don’t seem to ever have just one marble at a time; they usually come in bunches.

My current bunch of marbles looks something like this: walking six days a week, taking vitamins and supplements twice a day, wearing trifocals all the time, wearing shoes with support all the time, seeing the chiropractor weekly, sleeping with a cervical pillow, baking bread instead of buying it, and posting to my grandmother’s blog daily.

They say it takes about 8-10 weeks for a habit to really become part of your lifestyle. It’s been about two months since I started the walking and vitamins, and the rest have fallen in line pretty easily. The next bunch of marbles is shaping up to look something like this: drinking more water, strength training at the Y twice a week, postural balancing exercises daily, Kegel exercises, and adjusting Brother Bear’s braces every day.

So far, all my marbles are staying on my plate, and a few have even plopped.

Stay tuned for Part Two...