I feel good when I’m productive.
Earlier today I was reading an interpretation of my astrological chart. I’m not sure what my feelings on astrology are. I have a cousin who is an astrologer, I believe he’s done it professionally for a long time and writes for a few newspapers. I took an interest in it many years ago and he sent me some things to learn from, and then I read some here and there teaching myself a bit more. I find it interesting, but like anything I relate to spiritually, I’m always skeptical. I can believe in something, or in the possibility of something, while at the same time realizing that what I perceive is real in my mind, but not necessarily measurably real in the material world. As the same time, I love aspects of spirituality as I do perceive them, and astrology is enjoyable to read from time to time.
Anyway, the interpretation I got on my full chart had this section in it.
“The work that you do, and the services that you offer, are very important to your sense of identity. In order to feel good about yourself, you need to be busy with daily activities and to produce work you can be proud of. Focus on finding a suitable and rewarding avenue for expressing this part of you, being extra careful to choose an occupation in which you can express yourself. You are sensitive to criticism about the work you do, and you work best when you can create your own schedule. Positive feedback for the services you render is important to you, but be careful not to over-identify with the appreciation you receive from others, as your work and your health suffers when you feel under-appreciated. Motivation to do a good job should come from within.”
Regardless of the accuracy or lack their of, of the planets and what they say about a person, this happened to be quite accurate to me. When I came out of my years of alcohol induced haze and inactivity, what I did any given day became very important to me. Productivity, usually in cleaning and de-cluttering my house, was my measure of success. Then it was my ability to work. When I got my first job as a vet tech, I unintentionally based a lot of my self esteem in my ability to handle that job. I worked fourteen hour days, sometimes longer, with a head vet/owner who was verbally abusive at best some days. The turn over at that clinic was frightening. I remember one person who was hired and quit within two days, not because the head vet treated her terribly, she was still in the honeymoon period where our insecure boss was sucking up to her and trying to curry favor. But the new tech saw how those of us who had been there a while were treated and left, with that as her reason, because she wasn’t willing to tolerate that sort of toxic environment. I stayed for nearly a year, much longer then I should have. I was miserable and stressed and almost at my breaking point, and even when I had other job offers at much better clinics with higher pay, I felt guilt for leaving. Because I had based some of my sense of self in who I was there, in being someone who could stick it out and take the abuse, and in the first career in which I really got that satisfaction of productivity from my workplace. I left before it fucked me up beyond reasonable repair I think…I’m not sure, it was a close call and it took another six months before I could de-stress to any reasonable degree.
When everyone moved out of my household over the summer and I had the chance to live by myself for a few months, I was the only one to do what had been chores we split between the whole household. It was a huge boost to my mood each day when I finished all the morning chore list I had made for myself. I measured my mental health, my self worth, my success, by my productivity. “In order to feel good about yourself, you need to be busy with daily activities and to produce work you can be proud of.” That is me to the letter.
These days I’m wondering if that is really a good thing. It wasn’t really helpful when it kept me at a toxic job for long enough to come close to really damaging my mental health for a good long time, and doing a considerable bit of short term damage. It hasn’t been helpful recently when I’ve struggled with an increase in the symptoms of my bipolar disorder coupled with a lot of difficultly getting enough sleep. I’ve been less productive, my morning chore list goes half finished some days. This last semester I did my best for the place my head was, but it wasn’t the best I could do for me at top shape. And I really beat myself up for that some. I feel defeated many days because I do what would have been a whole hell of a lot for me a few years ago, but which isn’t close to as much as I did at my most productive times at jobs or when folks first moved it. For someone who gives few fucks about what others think of me despite death threats at times in my life, I’m terribly demoralized by a lack of cleaning the kitchen counter tops for a few days.
It can be a good thing. It really motivated me when I was trying to stop drinking, it helped me stay sober because of how much joy I got from being a wonderfully functional being. It pushed me to be better at my jobs, to seek a new career and pursue further knowledge and growth. It helped me de-clutter and get rid of about 2/3rds of my material possessions when I was nearly drowning in useless crap. My need to keep myself busy and do a measurable amount of useful shit in a day to feel good get things done. Until I hit a point where I need to relax and de-stress and can’t get things done for a bit because I’m just fucking out of spoons, and then it really isn’t helpful.
So I need a balance. And I need to find a way to utilize this particular aspect of myself to my advantage without letting it hurt me. Right now I’m a bit too much of my own worst enemy, and I’d like to be a fabulous rainbow of joy again. I’m still figuring out quite how to do that, but at least today was a productive day, so hopefully I can start to do that tomorrow from a satisfied confident frame of mind.
An Explosion of Rainbows 