One Thing at a Time

I am taking one thing at a time.

This is how I've been trying to live each day--one thing at a time, one minute at a time. If those minutes add up into hours, then it's one hour at a time. Hours to days, days to weeks. Weeks to months, unfortunately, is what this has turned into. Months of feeling lost.

I'm burned out from my personal life. I lost my health insurance, I don't have enough money to pay my bills, and I'm not eating enough to still run well. (Part of that is appetite and part of that is financial.)

I can run, but I tire so quickly. 3.1 is about all I can handle without feeling absolutely exhausted. Yet it never feels like enough. I can't even focus on my fall races right now. They're too far away (both time- and space-wise). I'm not sure how I'll get there and, if I get there, how well I'll run because my training plan is threadbare at this rate.

I'm trying.

I'm trying to focus more on professional endeavors, specifically teaching, because that is what brings me joy and, on days when I can't find that joy, it brings me momentary fulfillment. It distracts me from the problems in my personal life that I can't really do anything about.

I'm doing everything I can. Literally, I'm doing every single possible thing to help myself. And it's not enough to change things. So when all that's left is to worry, I need to shut off that valve so I don't pour more energy into that rabbit hole.

I'm really tired. Tired of applying for jobs I never hear back about. Tired of trying to turn unemployment compensation into a life. Tired of feeling like this situation won't improve.

I'm living check to check. I'm living sleep to sleep. I'm living blink to blink. One. Thing. At. A. Time. The poetry of mindfulness is lost on me some days because "being in the moment" requires more energy than I think I have left from worrying.

It's depressing.

Moments of "look how far you've come" are overshadowed by weeks of worry chalked up to bills I can't pay and jobs I don't have. I'm working harder than I've ever worked for anything and I've got nothing to show for it. Looking to see how far I've come isn't a fair comparison anymore. I feel no farther along because I want change--big changes, like not having to worry about finances, being able to get my medication, and being excited about life.

I'm plodding along.

One thing at a time. Everything "extra" has been shorn from my budget and, somehow too, my life. But I'm persevering. I'm keeping on.