Today, my note is short and simple. I’ve been living through an extended season of change. It’s felt very uncomfortable and I’m supporting myself by leaning into the things I love that feel really good to me. Moving my body, reading interesting stories, basking in direct sunlight for three minutes every morning and walking around my beautiful neighborhood are just a few of the things I’ve been doing that have felt extremely nourishing. As well as consuming a lot of good TV content, obviously. I watched the Martha Stewart documentary on Netflix and it was amazing. I had no idea the volume of content she has created and produced for her audience. It is truly legendary. I also watched The Stanford Prison Experiment Documentary on Hulu and it was equally amazing but also shocking and disturbing. Proceed with caution.
I volunteered twice in the last week in an effort to get myself out of my head and into community. It worked and was so worth the social anxiety I felt in the hours leading up to leaving my apartment. I have been working on a couple new user experience projects that have been really rejuvenating and exciting to think about, and I feel extremely grateful.
I’m growing, knowing I can’t always see a tangible change, and that sometimes feels scary but I know my experiences have equipped me well to navigate this changing water. I’m really excited to learn from two of my favorite yoga teachers next month in an online Katonah Yoga training. And I guess that is my strategy, keeping myself focused on the next thing I can learn and using my agency to develop skills that matter to me, like becoming a thoughtful yoga teacher. Focusing on what I can control has been really helpful in my daily thinking. I can not and do not ignore the many variables in my life and world I can’t control because they provide specific value in a very opposite way, but it makes the day a bit more digestible to my brain knowing I only have my contributions to create and stand behind.
I hope, especially today, you are taking really good care of yourself because when I think about our personal futures and our collective future, I really think we ought to operate from a place of extreme self love. We have to keep having fun, enjoying each other and our lives. We have to keep choosing joy. We can’t let something we can’t control take our individual joy away. I will be doing everything I can to have even more fun in each present moment.
Take really good care,
Michelle
P.S. If you haven’t heard of David Larbi or his content, do yourself a favor and explore! His content is truly such a gift to humanity.