Staying Strong

My goodness, it's been quite a week.

I'm not going to lie folks, although I am awesome and continue to be awesome, forces outside of my control are maybe not quite as awesome as I am.

We are as broke as we have ever been. John is as close to a job as he has ever been. These two things together make it easy to let them swirl up together and make an evil tornado that could potentially carry us both away.

Our car is broken, cannot be driven. I have a cavity, I feel it every time I breathe in. Our bills are starting to stack again and this whole week has been about how excited can John and I get to have one more bowl of popcorn and watch TV.

I am not complaining, truly, but I think it helps people who are going through the same thing to know that this is HARD. We are having hard times, doesn't mean bad times, but hard times it is. And what makes it even harder sometimes is knowing that relief is so close, things are happening with the tour business, connections are being made, friends are helping and I swear, John is days away (ack, maybe weeks, who am I kidding?) from hearing about a few jobs out there...

And again, this is where patience comes in. This is where discipline comes in, this is where Ram Daas and his "suffering comes from desiring what you cannot have" comes in. I am doing my best to take these days as gifts, John is available to help me with my site, we can spend time together, we are learning (oh my god how we're learning) that money isn't everything. I battle my materialistic demons every day and each day is a lesson in learning that worry will get me nowhere.

I have to keep taking the next step. Each day. Next step. And learning too, to not let my mind settle on worry, fear and useless thinking. I am literally re-training my brain how to think. It's not easy, I haven't succeeded yet, but this is the thing, once the relief is here, my god are my husband and I going to be so ready for each new thing, so ready to deal with money, so ready to put our new discipline and new thinking to good use.

So for anyone else suffering out there, the only thing I can say is to stop your monkey-mind, to keep working, to keep hoping, to keep knowing that your own relief is right around the corner and know that when it does come, you will be so ready to open all the doors and the windows to let it all in.

Happy Halloween.