Daily Prompt: Singing the Blues

We all feel down from time to time. How do you combat the blues? What’s one tip you can share with others that always helps to lift your spirits?

This is kinda tough – I find myself regularly feeling the blues, but I don’t actually talk about it. I know that most people will acknowledge it – call their girlfriends to talk about all their problems; or confront their issues immediately to rectify the situation etc etc. But I tend to do what most people do – eat their feelings.

Now, in saying that, I regularly make a point of telling people that I’m cold and dead on the inside – that I have no feelings… ‘Cold as ice’. But it’s not actually true. I do have feelings – I just don’t necessarily like to show them very often. I’m far too guarded.

Admittedly, I tend to be quite highly-sensitive to things that people do or say. As somebody who was bullied practically every day since I was a kid, and somebody who has been through more than their fair share of emotional shit… yes, I consider myself as being quite damaged from it all, and as a result, I generally tend to internalise everything and keep things to myself. But it has also led me to take more of a stand for those who are just like I was.

When I was younger, I suffered from depression, and that in-turn led to me suffering from Chronic Fatigue Syndrome. I really struggled to get myself out of that funk and find my happy… Things that I enjoyed just seemed to be too much to handle. Even things like seeing my friends was just incredibly uncomfortable, because I always felt like I just shouldn’t be around them – and I felt as though they didn’t really know what to say or how to act around me… which made me not want to socialise with them very much.

As I got older, I began to just focus what little energy I had onto the one thing that truly made me happy – dancing. I’d run myself into the ground, to the point where I’d have to crawl home. I’d be so completely exhausted, but I’d still find comfort in happiness in being able to still dance. It’s always been my one true love in life.

Now that I’m older, I find comfort in happiness in all kinds of different scenarios. Being able to actually have some social time with friends can actually make a huge difference for me, and create a positive shift in my mood. I find that it’s generally the small gestures from others that make the biggest impact for me – I guess because it’s so unexpected, and sometimes quite thoughtful.

I remember last year when I had a surgical procedure, i was off work for 2 weeks whilst I was at home, bed-ridden and bored recovering. A friend of mine sent me a small care-package in the mail, and because I hadn’t actually spoken to her recently, it made it so much more of a surprise. I felt completely elated when I received the parcel in the mail, as I had no idea what was inside.

That was a pivotal point in my life – and ever since, whenever a friend of mine has something getting them down, I’ll do something for them as a nice gesture. For example, the same friend who sent me the care package was, one day, feeling somewhat overwhelmed and upset due to some issues with her husband. She was feeling quite sad and confused, and so out of the blue, I decided to send her some flowers. Just a simple bouquet with a small box of chocolates, and the impact that it made on her life was truly remarkable. Upon receiving the flowers, she called me to thank me, and we ended up speaking for almost two hours – allowing her to talk about everything that was upsetting her and getting her down… and immediately, she felt relieved, and didn’t feel (or sound) as upset as she previously was.

So for those of you reading this, and happen to come across somebody you  know who may be feeling a bit down in the dumps – try doing something to surprise them – do something spontaneous either with them or for them. Send them some flowers. Turn up at their house and whisk them away for an adventure somewhere. Get them out of the house, and distract them. Talk to them about what’s troubling them – show them that you care… just do SOMETHING. Even if it goes completely south and turns out to be a terrible idea, you can both at least take comfort in knowing that you tried to do something nice for them.

It’s better to try and fail, than to never try at all.

 

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Day 9 – Favourite Hour of the Day

What is your favourite hour of the day?

Why is it that these questions are always so open?? I mean I could come up with at least half a dozen completely different hours for completely different reasons, and then spend another thousand-words explaining each of them…

1. Sunrise.

As much as I’m not a morning person, for all different kinds of reasons, I have seen my fair share of sunrises. I find it quite soothing for some reason. Regardless of how manic and stressful and busy my life has been / can be, for those few minutes watching the sun rise in the distance, it’s almost as if nothing else exists, and I’m just there, by myself, in the present, in this moment that almost feels like I’m suspended in zero gravity; as though the world around me has completely frozen in time. 

Even out of all of these, I think my absolute favourite sunrise, would be in Autumn / Winter when we used to live in the country – waking up at the crack of dawn; putting the kettle on; being all rugged up in trackpants and a big wooly jumper, thick socks and ugg boots; and standing just outside the doorway as the sun slowly makes its way onto the frost-covered grass in the backyard. Standing there with a giant cup of hot milo, steaming away; watching the steam from my breath on the freezing morning air… *sigh* it’s one of those really simple things in life that I truly took for granted, and now I miss it so much.

 

2. Mid-morning

 

I’m talking like 10:30 – 11am. Especially when you’ve woken up earlier, turned your alarm off, saying to yourself ‘Nope. Fuck this. I’m not getting out of bed today. I just can’t deal with ANYTHING today. I just can’t’. So you call work, tell them you’re sick and having a day off, and then you go back to sleep. I then usually sleep for another couple of hours and wake up around 10:30am, and eventually drag myself out of bed, wrapped up in my flannell pj’s, collapse on the couch with about six pieces of toast and a giant cup of tea, ready to go into a daze watching trashy morning television, which almost always leads to me spending waaaay too much time watching infomercials.

 

You know what, I think we could really use some non-stick stone cookware. That multi-chef chopper looks pretty damn good too, and it really would save a lot of time prepping in the kitchen. Hmmm I really DO need a steam mop. It would actually make my cleaning so much easier, and look, it doesn’t use ANY chemicals, which is so much better for the environment, and means I wont suffocate on fumes any more… ooh, and it comes in black… AND it has all those attachments… AND replacement pads…

 

…where did I put my wallet…??

 

3. Bed time

 

Well, I think many of us could agree that bedtime is just the bees-knees. I find that it’s so awesome to come home after a long, exhausting day to a hot shower and then just collapse into bed. Sometimes I wish I could just skip dinner and fall into bed and sleep for about 10hours. Man, I haven’t done that for a very long time!! I remember once when I was living in a share house, I had a habit of coming home just from a normal day of work at like 6pm, and sometimes I’d feel that exhausted, I’d literally fall face-first onto my bed, with my backpack still on my back, and I’d then wake up at about 3-4am, still with my bag on, and then I’d finally get undressed and crawl into bed.

 

Granted, during that time of my life, I think I was probably going through some kind of chronic fatigue relapse, and just didn’t realise it. Possibly, because I was sleeping so damn much, and loving every minute of it??