My Sneaky Little Brain

I didn’t listen to music while making dinner yesterday – I watched freakin’ Curb again! Ugh, so annoyed with myself. As soon as I came downstairs, I went right back into mindless mode. I wanted that dopamine hit of instant entertainment and justified it by saying to myself, “Come on Courtney, this is ridiculous. Everyone watches TV – this is not the end of the world.” And it’s true, it’s not the end of the world. However, it is taking me further away from my goal of detoxing from all of this instant gratification and getting back to something simpler and (hopefully) more fulfilling.

Did you ever notice that making a decision to do something big (like a 365 day challenge) is so exciting and motivating, in and of itself? But once the decision has been made, the daily reality sets in and motivation goes right down the toilet. How do you keep motivation up on a daily basis, even when you’re not seeing results yet? For me, this blog really is motivating. I think it would also help motivate me if I read a few pages from my old London journal (which I thankfully still have!) on a regular basis. That’s the lifestyle and mindset that I want to get back to, so it seems like a good place to start.

I’m just thinking of this right now, but I might be excusing my poor habits because of all the “stresses” of daily life like work, kids, cooking, cleaning, laundry, etc. In London, I was totally on my own and classes were my only major responsibility. There was no stress that needed to be relieved! However, I’m going to call BS on myself.

The things in my life are not stressors – they are just things. My brain can choose to label them as stressful or it can choose to see them simply as parts of my life that I’m actively choosing. I chose to have kids and life would be bland and unfulfilling without them. Yes, they are agents of chaos and destruction, but they are also loving, hilarious, and bring countless smiles to my face every day. I choose to make them healthy lunches every day even though it adds an extra step to my morning. I think to myself “I don’t want to do this”, but I do want to do it. If I didn't want to do it, I would just shove Lunchables into their backpacks (no shame in Lunchables...you know what I mean). I groan about work sometimes, but I am doing exactly what I want to be doing. Maybe my brain will always find things to complain about because that’s what brains are good at (at least mine is). Even when I was single and carefree in London, I bet my brain did the same damn thing. Looking back at my journal could shed some light on this!