I think I'm just in a mood

[ellienihon]

I was reading some posts and found myself being extremely judgemental. Of their arrogance, grammar, intelligence, you name it. The reason I'm writing about it is that I'm doing the same thing to myself. I find myself here in another country with few people who I can talk to about what's in my head, so my critic is going unchecked at the moment. I'm beating myself up for many things, mostly small stuff that noone notices. I take care of paying the bills and making sure I have food and clean dishes and go to work and participate in my choirs and the Alanon meeting I started and write an inventory every day, but that's not what I notice. I have a list of things to buy that's unchanged for the past 2 months. I also have things to send home, including some money issues that have been on my to do list for almost as long. My apartment is not very clean, and I have a bunch of dry cleaning to take care of. I haven't participated in the online support groups I'm in. I haven't been doing Judo or writing in my LJ, or doing the stuff from The Artist's Way (although I've been good about doing daily morning pages.) .

At home, I would talk with people as these things came up, be reassured that I was doing a good job, and get encouragement to take the next step towards what I wanted. My critic would be countered by this, and life was good. The way things are going right now, I don't have friends here that I trust to tell me what they think. I just haven't known these people for long enough. My critic has no counter that it doesn't discount ("they don't really know how bad Ellie is")

The result is that I havne't been sleeping well, and just generally feel stressed out. Something is going to have to shift, because I don't want to live like this. As I see it, I can continue to work on supporting my own self-loving feelings, but I need to get some outside support. therefore I'm writing this. I didn't start this post with this intention, but there it is. I'm okay, and right now I just need to have that reaffirmed from the outside.

Everyone tells me how impressed they are with the amount of courage it takes to be here, and how much I'm gambatteiru (tryiing hard). I just did the next thing. Right now, I'm in a pattern that has me stuck in a couple areas of my life and I don't know how to change that without help. I'm hoping that now that I've written this I will be able to speak with some friends here and get some support. Have I mentioned I'm really looking forward to going home for vacation? I'm going to go sleep now. work in the morning.

Comments

[markmc03.livejournal.com]

We all have days, and sometimes weeks, like that. I really don't know what to do other than ride them through. Knowing that we can control our thoughts doesn't make it any easier because, frankly, sometimes we want to feel lousy. Getting to the heart of why we want to feel lousy is sometimes a trick. And often you never get a satisfactory answer. Most of us don't like to be reminded that we have terrible self-esteem issues. I know that's a big part of my own trouble, but I don't know what the cure for that is - other than hiring a cheering section. Hang in there and find some way to give yourself hope. The trip home is a good one to focus on. Knowing that the future is always changing and that good things can happen too also helps. So hang in there! Better days ahead.

[ellienihon.livejournal.com]

Actually, just posting this seems to have helped. I had a really good day today.

[tender-bottom.livejournal.com]

It's hard to keep the Critic from getting you down, but if anybody can, it's you! We miss you, and think about you often. You'll be home for a visit in no time.