As mentioned in previous posts, I used to write up daily reviews for myself and stopped posting on my blog all together after I tried to convert this website into a “professional” website with the intention of building a pipeline of “followers.” To be clear: nothing is wrong with professional websites that are designed to drum up business. However, what I didn’t recognize at that time was that (and only starting to realize now) is that — counter what other people have perceived — I’m motivated by social acceptance. In other words, I’m highly driven to reduce rejection, criticism.

Okay, with that now out of the way.

I’m taking a moment to pause, to breath, to draw in a few deep breathes and reflecting because I’m noticing that the last couple weeks, months really, it feels as though my brain is more scattered, firing off on a hundred cylinders. To elaborate, my levels of “productivity” are at a all time low. When I say productivity, I’m strictly referring to my consulting business, referring to direct income (“cash”) generating activities. Because outside of that, I’m finding myself filling the day with:

• Waves of Focus (asynchronous, self-paced) online course
• Reading several books: “The first rule of mastery: stop worrying about what people think of you”, “Good Inside” by Dr. Becky Kennedy
• Exploring myself with daily stretching, bi-weekly dance classes
• Doubling down on learning more about rhetorical structure theory (RST) – I’ve always wanted to increase my ability to see connections between spans of text AND I’m betting that with additional skills of detecting coherence relations, I can improve as a writer.

But … Maybe I’m burned out.

Maybe I’m overwhelmed with the transition from a married man to a single father.

Maybe I’m still grieving over the lost of my relationships, friends and family, back in the states.

Likely, a combination of all three (and others as well).

At the same time, I’m rooted in gratefulness. Just this morning, I was listening to Eminem’s “Mocking Bird”, a song that I used to listen on repeat when it was first released (20 years ago). The song somehow surfaced to Spotify playlist. Regardless, as I was listening to the song while walking the dogs back home from their morning walk, I found myself stopping in the middle of the side walk, tears forming in the corner of my eyes, a few lines in the song really hitting home:

Now I’m sitting in this empty house just reminiscing
Looking at your baby pictures, it just trips me out
…

But things have got so bad between us, I don’t see us ever being
Together ever again, like we used to be when we was teenagers
But then, of course, everything always happens for a reason
I guess it was never meant to be
But it’s just something we have no control over, and that’s what destiny is