Thinking About Life Goals

In my last post, I talked about my desire to get to doing things. One of the reasons for that is to get past the “planning and preparation” stages that I so often eagerly jump into but just as often don’t progress beyond. Now, the reason for that is partly because I’m just that way and planning things is enough for me… I like to do that kind of thing! But the main reason why is because I get so caught up in my head, overthinking things or waiting until things or I myself am “the most ready” for whatever.

This causes inaction. Or at the very least just a lot of planning and talk but very little follow-through. Which is quite annoying for me, and I’m sure for those involved in my daily life.

Which is why I’m having a difficult time right now!

The Problem

How would I deal with this? By reading all of Marie Kondo’s books and using the MariKondo method for tidying my things and my apartment.

My “restart plan” essentially outlined what my current major goal is: To do more with each of my days by stop letting clutter get in my way.

My progress so far? Not as… progressed as I would like.

To be fair, Marie said in one of the books that the process can take a long time, sometimes even 6 months. While I don’t think I’ll be working on the tidying part of things for that long, I know that figuring out how to live my life in balance with my things and space will be an ever-changing pursuit as I learn and grow through life.

BUT while I’m going through the process of tidying, cleaning, organizing, and whatnot… I feel like I’m doing the whole, “I’m doing the thing! I’m doing the thing!! I’m going to engage with life again, BUT FIRST I just need to tidy things up and get ready. Then I can start with things again!” thing again. Yanno?

And while there’s a certain amount of time I’m going to have to devote to tidying before I can start to engage with new things, I can’t get stuck here for too long. I can’t afford to keep prepping for what I want and not actually go for the things that I want.

What To Do

Instead of focusing exclusively on getting by with daily life, work, and tidying while sort of “kicking the can” for the real things that I want to focus on down the road, I need to set some other goals for myself. I need to look at myself in a hypothetical future, picture what I’d like to see that look like, then use that to figure out what I’d like to do with my life.

I never really did have a solid, “I wanna do this big epic specific job when I grow up” over my growing up years. Well, I did say that many times, but the career options kept changing with my interests. And I’ve done so many different things over the years that I don’t really have one thing that’s been more important to me than anything else. Well, for the most part.

So, with that in mind, and while still devoting plenty of time to my mental and physical well-being, I’m going to be giving this topic some serious thought over the next several days. It’s an interesting question, the answer to which I’m quite interested to see. What do I want to do when I grow up?

Matthew’s Restart Plan

My last post was two years ago (almost exactly). I’ve written a few draft posts in the intervening time, but haven’t completed any of them or felt comfortable what I ended up writing. So let’s ignore the time gap and jump back into things!

Now that the COVID-19 pandemic is seemingly “over-ish”, you’re probably seeing a bunch of ‘restart plans’ out there as I have seen. They outline how we’ll all work together to get back to ‘normal’ or try to figure out how to do the things that we haven’t been able to do for the past two years.

In the early days of 2020, I was excited to finally start doing things again, especially after an excruciatingly painful previous year. My health was beginning to bounce back with my new treatments, my then-boyfriend was finally coming back for a month to visit and talk about plans for the future, I was moving back in with some of my family, and a few other positive things.

I was also looking forward to reconnecting with people that I hadn’t been able to keep in touch with while dealing with all of my physical, mental, and spiritual health problems. So you can imagine my disappointment, discouragement, and outright dismay after thing after thing started to go wrong after that.

Anyway, flash forward to now!

Since that time, I feel like I’ve been putting pretty much everything on hold; More than ever before, actually. To some degree that was required, as we all had to do our part in the pandemic response. But also, in my situation, things weren’t so great for the past two years… and I was essentially in survival mode.

It’s time to move beyond that! I’ve put in a lot of work to deal with my anxiety, depression, OCD, ADD, OMG, CPTSD, CFS, and other (seemingly unending) ongoing problems.

I don’t know why exactly, but I’ve been having this sense of– I don’t know exactly what word to use… renewal! A sense of renewal has been in the air, and I’ve been itching to act on it. Which brings me to one of the specifics of my “restart” plan!

What I mean by my “restart plan” should be fairly obvious by now, but I’d like to clarify it here as I’m using this post as a way to straighten out my thoughts and as one of the ways to document the journey for myself/others. Basically, I’m restarting my life after years of being sick (with my Crohn’s and related) and feeling disconnected from everything and everyone. I’m tired of watching things happen around me as I try to cope and survive instead of engaging and being involved. Having things happen with me or because of me, and not for the usual ‘health-related’ reasons.

So to that end, I’ve decided that my first step should be to transform my habitat to start transforming the way I live day-to-day! And I’ve decided to employ the KonMari Method of tidying to teach myself a completely new way to approach how I think about my things and my living space.

Through the process I’m hoping to reevaluate my life and figure out what priorities I truly would like to honour as I move forward. I’d also like to learn more about my past through the things I have decided to hold onto, then let go of those things with a grateful and kind mindset to make way for the present and the future.

This is the beginning of a new chapter. And I’m ALL IN.

It’s a new season!

yellow petal flowers in clear glass vase

Welcome to a brand-new season of life here in the after times! What a time, eh?

I’m sitting here on the sofa; staring at the screen, considering what to write. There’s so much that I could write about, but where to start I don’t know. Much has changed in my life, yet much has stayed the same.

How about we start with the big changes!

Moving

I moved to the Vancouver area a few years ago and at first I was living with my mother and sister. It was pretty great! After a few months of job searching I was hired at the cafe where my sister worked, which meant we got to work shifts together a lot. Then I met my partner Steven and, because I couldn’t stay with my mom for too much longer, the two of us quickly moved in together. We made a wonderful little home for the both of us in that apartment over the past two-ish years. But Steven had to move back to the US and I couldn’t stay there by myself any longer.

This past January/February I had the opportunity to move in with one of my brothers, which was quite ideal as we get along very well and like to collaborate on creative projects together and play games. I also kind of need someone around to help me when my Crohn’s is being cantankerous, which my brother is good with.

So now I have moved across town and am enjoying a new apartment, a new neighbourhood, and reconnecting with my brother more! 😄

My tummy

In the fall I started a new treatment for my Crohn’s disease, which has been pretty okay. It’s been kind of a major change for me that’s taken some discomfort and adjustment, but my body’s been responding well to it so far. I’m still not 100%, but I don’t really expect to be since this is kind of just the way things are.

The new treatment is also to help with some other health issues I’ve developed over the past year, and it seems to be helping with those things as well. It doesn’t fix or reverse the problems, but it does alleviate the symptoms significantly, prevent further damage, and manage the inflammation in my body. Which is a huge blessing!

But the hugely good news is that my disability application was approved! 🙌 That has opened a bunch of doors to additional support for my healing journey and taking care of my body, so I don’t have to live with quite so much adversity day-to-day. I’m thankful every day that I’m able to take care of myself better with this extra support.

Oh yeah…

There’s also been this whole COVID-19 pandemic happening. It’s not been that big of a change for me so far as I mostly stayed home to begin with. (Physical disabilities and depression are too real!) But with my compromised immune system, it’s especially important that I stay quarantined from the rest of the world right now. I don’t want to deal with more health issues and be more of a problem for medical professionals to deal with! 😹

Otherwise, quarantine has been alright. There’s a lot of not-so-great things that have happened in my life because of the pandemic, but I’m alive and (mostly) healthy, I have food and a bed, so yeah… not too much of a deal for me. I’m an old pro at this.

Other stuff

You’ve heard of Murphy’s Law before? Yeah? Cool.

You know how when things start to go wrong, they all go wrong at almost the exact same time? Right? I can’t be the only one that’s familiar with that phenomenon (do do dododo).

Well… with the world going crazy, right now’s the perfect time for more things to go wrong! In fact, the universe is making almost everything go wrong right now! I mean, for the most part things are okay. But there have been significant changes in my life and within my family that have forever shifted the way my world functions.

I won’t go into specifics as this doesn’t seem like the proper place to do that, but suffice to say that things have happened and people have made decisions that have left me… hurt and confused, I guess. I’m not entirely sure what all the implications are yet. This whole situation is still fresh and developing so I don’t know what’s going to be happening tomorrow let alone next week. And some pretty big decisions are heading my way, along with some big challenges that are going to be difficult to face.

There’s more…

Other than that, I’m doing pretty well. I want to blog a little more, maybe do some live streams with friends, play games, work on coding projects, and deal with life as best as I can. Oh, and I’ve also had another significant change in my life occur in the last month… but that’s a secret for now! I’ll share more later. 🤐😝

For now, I’m going to say goodnight to you and probably read over this post before I hit publish.

So…

Goodnight, friends! 👋

Note that the title of this post is a reference to a song from one of my favourite shows, Galavant!

Also note that I gave up editing this post before I published it. Cool.

It’s been a long time…

…but not that long.

I’m back now and that’s what counts.

Besides, I’ve been unable to blog for various reasons.

Sounds like it’s time for an update!

What’s new with me

I think that I told you about leaving my job a few months ago due to health problems relating to my Crohn’s. Well, that’s been an ongoing issue with a bunch of other problems that go along with it, like mental health. That’s been a major struggle.

I have an app to track my mood and activities on a daily basis, which is really helpful for me. I can look back at the past and see trends in a colourful graph with information that connects activity and mood. The app is called Daylio; I highly recommend it to anyone who’s interested in understanding their mental health and mood. It’s not a complete solution, but it’s a great tool. The best part is that it’s well designed, free of ads, can be used for free, and when you pay for it, it’s a single, one-time purchase. So good.

Anyway, the past several weeks have been not so great-looking in my app, with some really bad days. Depression has been a constant companion for me, which isn’t fun or easy. Panic attacks, lack of motivation, and no interest in doing “normal things” have become the norm. Don’t get me wrong, there’ve been some great things happening too. But overall I’m feeling not so good.

Which brings me to another not fun thing that’s happened. My partner had to go back to the States for the summer. Which isn’t fun either. Especially in a city with not many close friends.

There’s also good news!

On the flip side, I finally FINALLY have a family doctor!! 🙌 It’s taken so long for this, but it’s finally here and it’s just so helpful and good for my continuing medical care.

There’s a clinic that is one SkyTrain stop away from my house that recently had two new doctors move in… and they have been accepting new patients! Which was such a relief, let me tell you. Although, the process was kind of underwhelming… I was expecting more issues getting a family doctor. Like it ended up being too easy.

I filled out the attachment request form, or whatever it’s called, they called me back, setup an appointment, and voila! I have a doctor. Simple, easy, peasy. Glad that it wasn’t more of a pain to do that. So YAY! 😸

I also have a counsellor that I don’t have to pay for out-of-pocket. Which is amazing and really quite timely with all of these long-term mental issues coming at me full force. Things really have worked out as I always believe they will. It’s just difficult to deal with my obsessive brain panicking and whatnot.

Good times!

So yeah, things have been very wild these past few weeks! There was also a little thing with my blog’s domain name expiring and I couldn’t renew it right away, but now that I have, I’m back to blogging weekly. Yay for rebuilding the writing habit!

I think it’ll be good for me to get back into my blog. Gives me something to focus on that’s not too strenuous and a good creative outlet that feels good on my brain. So get ready for more posts from me!

Oh yeah…

I also started recording a new podcast with a friend here in Vancouver, which just rocks. Every time that I’ve done a podcast it’s been with people across the internet, which is amazing—don’t get me wrong. It’s so wild that I can do podcasts with people who live across the continent from me. I love it.

It’s nice to be able to do a project like that with someone in person. So this has been a real treat! Especially since we record at the Vancouver Public Library’s studio space. Such a fantabulous resource.

We haven’t quite published the podcast yet… but it’s coming very soon. I’ll keep you update.

Anywhom!

That’s all for now. Tune in next week to hear me giggle like a hyena! 🤣

This week in Matthew’s life…

All week I’ve been thinking about some really interesting posts to write here on the ol’ bloggy blog, and I started drafting one of them. However, I have yet to finish writing it, so I’m going to do a short update on some current goings on!

Currently listening to Galavant

Once we caught up on Game of Thrones, I introduced Steven to Galavant! It’s like The Princess Bride but funnier, Game of Thrones but fewer boobs and blood, and Ella Enchanted all rolled into one musical sitcom that’s simply delightful!

(That’s right, it’s a musical. And if you don’t like that, then you don’t understand happiness and joy! You monster!! 👹)

Since we started watching the show (we finished season one already!) we’ve both had the songs stuck in our heads and we can’t get them out! Especially the main theme. (I listen to the soundtrack quite often so I am quite familiar with the lyrics, too!) It’s both super fun and kinda annoying. Not annoying in a serious way that will end with me being rightfully accused of murder, but just kinda like a stray hair that won’t be tamed.

Currently obsessed with Cities: Skylines

I’ve mentioned it before and I will most deffos mention it again…
…I love city building games! Especially Cities: Skylines!

This week I’ve been filling in my newest city with more dense neighbourhoods and details for all of my sims to enjoy in their simulated lives. ☺️ This current city, Las Cruz, is one of the most intricate cities I’ve built yet thanks to the lessons I’ve learned from previous cities and adding a few mods from the Steam Workshop.

I’ve also been wanting to start making videos about my cities for YouTube, kinda like a “let’s play” series, but with a little bit of an improvised story about the city or something–very silly and Matthew-esque.

I really need and want to take a break from city building though.

Currently watching Game of Thrones and Star Trek: Discovery

I started watched Game of Thrones a few years ago with my geeky friends in my hometown. Rachel and Jessica introduced me to the series, as well as Galavant among others, and about a month ago I introduced it to Steven. We were determined to get him caught up on all seven seasons (70-ish hours) before the premiere of season 8 this past Sunday. However, we were also trying to be good about our TV habits and not go too crazy. HA!!

Rewind to last Friday (the Friday before season 8 started) when we were realizing that we were barely going to be able to watch everything in time. In fact, we missed the premiere by 2 hours even though we didn’t end up sleeping Saturday night or Sunday morning! That’s right, we stayed up all weekend and didn’t quite make it!

Oh well, we still watched the premiere after that all. But the whole weekend was so intense and overwhelming! Really fun though–I haven’t binged so hard in a long while. I got quite the thrill! 😜

And last night (this Friday) was the finale of Discovery. What a crazy season two we’ve had! It’s all come to an end already… and I haven’t watched it yet. I really don’t want it to end even if I’m left wondering what happens next. (The next sentence kinda contains softcore spoilers.) Everyone’s about to sacrifice themselves to protect all sentient, organic life from complete obliteration by some misbehaving AI and I still don’t know what happens to them all. But that’s alright because I’d rather be left with this cliffhanger than be left without new Trek episodes until the fall.

Also, I’m waiting for a friend to watch it with us. Then I’ll have the answers I seek.

Currently thinking about measles

It’s scary here in Metro Vancouver right now. There’s an outbreak of measles and because I’m immunocompromised… I’m at greater risk of infection even though I was vaccinated!

I know that the chances of my contracting measles is very low and I’ll probably be okie dokie, but I have to rely on everyone else having been vaccinated so the disease can’t spread around the city and reach me. Which is something that’s proved kinda anxiety inducing. Especially considering that vaccination rates are lower than what’s necessary to be effective in BC and in many parts of Canada and North America. (Although, recent outbreaks have prompted more people to get vaccinated, which is very encouraging!)

Just this past week there was a new confirmed case of measles in the city. The infected person went to a mall while they were contagious but not yet showing symptoms…and I had been in that very mall the evening before. 😵 Sure, close only counts in horseshoes, but what makes it scarier is I was considering going back to the mall the next day–the very day the infected person was there!

I know, I know…it’s unlikely I’ll get measles. But the chance of exposure does go up here in a city that’s experiencing an ongoing outbreak. The point is that I’m not the only immunocompromised person that relies on herd immunity to prevent themselves from contracting any number of highly contagious and preventable diseases, yet some people actively work to remove this important layer of protection. It baffles my mind.

There’s someone on Vancouver Island that’s currently quarantined in their home for 21 days because they are immunocompromised and were exposed to measles at their workplace. They can’t go outside their home for three whole weeks! So please, if you are able to get vaccinated, please make sure your shots are up to date!

Currently finishing this post

Well that’s about it for now. Other than I’m also currently feeling fairly inspired to work on a bunch of projects and ideas rolling around in my head, but I haven’t actually done too much to act on that inspiration yet. I did get books from the library for one thing though, and it’s got me more excited! 🙌 Gotta keep doing things!

Or at least try.

Edit: Oh! I also got a haircut today!

Where to start?

I sometimes have high expectations for myself.

🤨

Okay… very high expectations.

😑

Yes, yes. I often have unrealistically high expectations for myself.

This blog is one of those things. Even though I don’t end up putting too much effort into what I write on here (most things end up being silly and totally great!), I do tend to let my high expectations prevent me from just writing.

It’s annoying and I don’t like it. I find that it gets in the way of many things and leads to my low-key freaking out or nearly breaking down because I’m not good enough. Or, at the very least, the things I do aren’t good enough.

Question to self: What even is this “good enough”? Good enough for what? For whom? And why?

Even now, as my partner read what I wrote so far, I’m feeling like this post won’t be that good either. I mean, it’s probably because I don’t have a point to make… I started this post as I often do; not knowing what I’m going to type.

Maybe it’s all part of imposter syndrome? Or maybe since I’m generally good at doing a lot of things, I fear that I’ll not do a great job, so instead of doing my best and having it possibly fail, I either intentionally fail and laugh it off as a joke, or I stress about it and worry that whatever I’m doing won’t be good enough.

But again… good enough for what? What standard do I need to meet? Why can’t I just not be worried about this?!?!

…

Man, I need to chill.

Anyway…

I actually intended to give you an update about my life over the past several months. Let’s do that instead!

Sooo… where to start?

I’m tempted to start at the very beginning… 🎶 A very good place to start! 🎶 etc, etc

Over the past couple of weeks, I was actually surprised with very unexpected visits from three people! One of my aunts was in town and texted me two Fridays ago… and then last Friday my sister came home and we dragged her bags down to the ferry… and also last Friday one of my bestest friends from my home town texted me and we had a wonderful evening with each other and our partners! I hadn’t seen her in almost TWO YEARS!!! It’s crazy!

It’s been quite the time, let me tell you… 😸 and quite the boost for my spirit!

Other than that… I left my position at my cafe, which is really exciting and good for my overall health. (I was going crazy over there!) I kinda miss that place and making drinks for the regular customers, but I don’t miss being in charge and having to deal with all of the manager-type junk by myself.

The one downside is that I should probably start working somewhere else fairly soon. I’ve already applied at IKEA (HA!) and a few other places, but I have no clue what I’ll be doing. It’s an adventure!

Spring is definitely here and summer is speeding towards us! (Us being Vancouver and the surrounding area.) I’m so happy to see life coming back in my surroundings along with the warmer weather. It makes getting outside more pleasant and brings the opportunity for more outdoor activities, such as kayaking, hiking, geocaching, and spraying smokers with water! Can’t wait!

I also have renewed creative juices flowing and new inspiration for projects that I want to work on! I’m really excited about them all, and I can’t wait to share them with the world! It will take some time before I can do that, and I’ll also need to buy some new equipment, but I really want to do more projects. I need to do more projects. I need that outlet.

And after all of that rambling I hope that you’re not left feeling confuzzled and dazed. That’s all for now, so I’ll say bye bye.

See ya later, friends! 👋

Weekly, not daily!

I’m gonna start blogging again. However, instead of writing a new post every single day, I’ll be posting once a week. Unless I feel like there’s more to say, but my weekly minimum post count shall be one.

Over the past few weeks I’ve been clicking through my blog and rediscovering some aspects of my recent history that have helped me to gain a greater sense of place and progress. Some of the posts have also reminded me for what I used to hope and strive. It’s a good exercise, and exactly the point of my *formerly* daily blog.

I hope that by resuming my blog, I’ll exercise my creative mind and aspire to put fingers to plastic in my never ending pursuit of doing stuff. Also, I hope to be more accountable to myself and continue documenting what I’m thinking for future Matthew to reflect upon.

Until next post! 😸

A funny thing happened today…

…but I don’t recall the details.

*shrugs*

Oh, well. You’ll just have to live with the knowledge that there was a funny moment in my day today, the details of which you will not know.

Today was a good day! So very much better than yesterday. Granted, I didn’t have a good night’s sleep last night, and my tummy decided to be a pain this afternoon and evening, but everything else was so good!

I finally got to see a gastroenterologist, which has been such a long time in coming. Things are looking good in getting a better Crohn’s support team established! Which is quite important for me. And I’ve been learning and discovering just how needed this stuff is over the last couple of months with some changes and observations I’ve made in my disease. Such a win!

Other than that, I am not in Vancouver yet. Because of unforeseen circumstances, I will instead be leaving tomorrow morning. Which is perfectly fine with me!

I hope that you’re having a wonderful day, my friend! 😀 If not, here’s a few gifs that might not help at all, but I’m going to include anyway. Maybe it’ll do something for you.

Note to self: Find gifs and put them here.

Note to self: See? I did it. 😑 😀

Another quick one today.

Just gonna check in. I don’t have the mental energy to write something more than an update.

Today has been long and hard. I consider it to be a good day, though. It started with less sleep than I needed. Again. This time was mostly do to me purposely staying up last night. But because I couldn’t sleep Saturday night, and I went to bed late last night, my body has been off. But my sleep over the past couple of weeks has been messed up anyway. So it’s nothing new.

I did a bunch of work today, which was good. I’m excited about it and ready to complete everything later this week. We’re getting Paddlefest stuff going again! Woot!

I also got to have a video chat with some fans from The Aux Cable. That was probably the highlight of my day! So much fun. ^_^

Packing up my stuff to relocate to Vancouver did not happen. I was overwhelmed and didn’t complete the mission. I’ll get it done tomorrow.

That’s about it. Tomorrow will be really busy, so I’ll probably do another small update. But after that… I’ll write more fun stuff! Until then, goodnight and good luck.

My nose.

It’s a love/hate relationship. My nose is causing me such problems right now. It’s hard to breathe, I’m constantly stuffed up, and I have to repeatedly blow my nose. It’s bleeding, it’s hurting, and it’s generally unpleasant.

Allergy season sucks.

Plain and simple.

At least I have a nose, though, eh? *shrugs*