I have learned...

2. That being easygoing is a virtue. I'm a pretty flexible person. I wasn't always in the past. But I have learned to take the unexpected and just roll with it. I guess when I figured out how to take an unexpected divorce and eventually roll with it, anything is easy after that. My mother, who very rarely analyzes me and tells me about it, said to me the other day "You have become very resilient in your adulthood." I think a lot of it is my easygoing ability. I used to watch my ex, who never seemed to care about anything, and think that he was lying to me all the time. I still think he was to an extent, but sometimes I think he actually didn't care. it wasn't important enough to him to care about. I think that in the context of a marriage that is destructive, but in my situation gaining that ability (which I always have but was never able to exert in my marriage for some reason - possibly in defense to counteract his constant not caring?) has become a benefit. I have had several occasions where I have had to step back and tell myself, "Is this really worth caring about, or can I just go with the flow?" and realize that it's not worth my energy to fight it.

That is a main part in monitoring my stress levels. learning when to not care, and when to fight for what I believe in. I have a difficult situation among my friends where I happen to have all the knowledge on a situation (I am the one that for some reason, everybody comes to me with their problems/thoughts/worries/etc.) but no one person has the entire story, they all know different pieces. This makes it sticky because while I do not want to break confidences by telling others what they don't know, everybody is making important decisions based on their limited knowledge and I am afraid they will be hurt when they find out it's not what they thought it would be. So how do I handle this? It stresses me out knowing that pretty much everybody is going to be upset in the end, but I do not want to lose the confidence of any one person, I value that trait about myself. So while this decision weighs heavy on my mind I must decide whether this is enough to stress myself over, or if I can just roll with it and let everybody learn their lesson that hard way.

I have learned however, that major decisions cannot be made immediately, part of learning to be easygoing. it is often the smart and beneficial move to put it on the back burner, go about life for a day or two, and come back to it. Such a short amount of time can lend a major perspective on a given situation.

I have also learned to not need to have all the information right away. It will come in it's own time, when it is right. Freaking out only makes it harder on me, and the information does not come any faster. BIG lesson for me. I guess this ties in with the divorce pretty well. It was very rare to have good days, or days where I felt hope or happiness. Often those days would fall in between days where I would be making major decisions or waiting for important information. I had to learn to force myself to shelve all my worries and ride out the good feelings as long as I could, just to stay alive. Nobody can live long in utter misery. A good moment has to be thrown in, even briefly, for good decisions and actions to be made.