Swimming Upstream

While I feel like this summer in Brainerd has been a less stressful time in my life, I still hear the phrase "swimming upstream" float through my mind at least once a day. I am not working and I am far away from most of my family and friends, and I still feel like it's nearly impossible to keep up with the day-to-day, let alone do things for me.

Guess what the problem is? Me.

It's not that it's nearly impossible, it's that I am prioritizing my time incorrectly - or maybe just differently. When I really look at it, I am taking time for me ... it just doesn't look exactly how I imagined it would.

I am going to the YMCA regularly. I am reading. I am growing a vegetable garden.*

If I'm honest, I guess I thought I would come up here and turn into Little Miss Productive. I should be sewing all of our family clothes by now! I should be a Scrapbooking Queen! I should have all my life's goals 3/4 of the way accomplished!

In reality, we still have 2 or 3 boxes that are unpacked. I'm (probably unwisely) dreaming of moving to a place a little less country. We're working to have some semblance of a social life and to find a church where we feel we fit in.

I need to give myself a little grace and just be happy with where I am. Being satisfied with my current place in life is new to me; I'm still working on it. Always looking forward to the next thing is a bad habit of mine and I know it's not good for me.

***

With that said, over the next few days, you're going to see me post some links to some other websites. Some projects I truly want to complete within, say, the next 6 months. Some ideas that I find truly inspiring. To be honest - my web browser has been open for weeks with a couple of pages that I don't want to forget about! So, I'm going to post them here and who knows, maybe they'll inspire you too!

*Part of the problem here is that it's been a cold, wet summer and we haven't seen many of the fruits of this garden ... yet. So it doesn't feel as rewarding as I would like it to.