Some really great advice from a friend

Every now and again the right person comes along grabs you by the shirt front and says "this is the way it is and you need to see it right now".  I have a few of those friends in my life and ever now and then they do exactly that, grab my shirt front and say "Mary Louise, get over it".  I need that at times more than anything else.  Christina once again wrote this wonderful response in regard to yesterday's post about my fear, insecurity and doubt.  This is what she said........

Charlie,


I think that perfectionist are their own worst enemies. And most artists I know are perfectionists. I know because I am one and it has cost me a great deal of joy too in my life. Not wanting company to come visit for example because the house wasn't perfectly clean, not finishing a vision of some outfit because I thought it would not be perfect. Sometimes it is in the mistakes we find the perfect design, the perfect vision. But if we hold back out of fear we never get to see what we are capable of accomplishing.

Getting ill I had to give up on a lot of my perfectionist attitudes because I could no longer control how clean the house was because someone else had to clean it. I found I wasted a lot of opportunities for happiness that had come my way because I was afraid of feeling like a failure.

We sabotage our own success out of fear of failure before we ever attempt a project. I have done it myself in the past too. One thing I found that helps is to just jump in and "do it". Don't concentrate on the end results so much as the ride.


Enjoy the roller coaster ride in life for it ends all too suddenly. Think how boring a roller coaster would be if it just went on a flat surface going at a safe speed.It might be safe, there may not be any anxiety over that ride because there would be no insecurity or fear of failure taking out the "what if's" but how boring, a journey it would be!

The ups and downs are what make life's journey so exciting. Entering a fashion contest can be very stressful but it is the difficulty going up that ride that makes riding down the coaster with the wind in your hair and your hand holding the prize in so exciting. So very, very worth it.


So don't look at the ride with the scary bumps ahead as the thing that holds you back. Look at the ride in life and the scary parts being the thing that takes you to the amazing view at the top that makes the journey in life so amazing!

Carpe Diem! Seize the day and don't fret the small stuff, for it won't matter when we're gone anyway.


Sending my love!

Christina

Thanks for the grabbing my shirt front and reminding me something I knew in the back of my head and needed to see anytime you need to do it again please do. In the meantime I am embracing my inner FIERCE self, Look out because here comes THE FIERCENESS!!!

You are not alone.........

I just had to take the time and thank Christina for her comment to yeseterday's blog.  She is this very dear friend of mine from the Chicago area and she is like a second mother to me.  Simply because I know she gets exactly what I am talking about, a fellow sufferer of Fibromyalgia I adore her more than she knows.  There are many times I wish I was closer to help her and Larry with what they face, but I do know she is in my thoughts and prayers all the time.  This is what she wrote...........

Oh I can relate. I know that somewhere, somehow there is an answer to this profound fatigue that pulls you into the bowels of hell, pain that chews you up and spits you out leaving you writhing in bed despite pain meds.


I keep telling Larry that I just wish I could walk , and stand and just get a hug like other people without it being so painful and so darn tiring. Just to get ready to go somewhere takes all the energy I have. Then going to whatever place takes days worth of energy that I must then spend days doing nothing to recoup. It is a heavy price to pay to go to the grocery store or out to see family.


But despite it all I don't give up because that is not in my nature and not yours either. I guess that is the secret to winning this war on fibro/chronic fatigue, not giving up and waiting for that cure. I just hope I haven't lost the best part of my life by the time they find it. Until then I too, do the best I can, the most I can, and pay the price for trying to just enjoy the simple things in life.


Don't despair, there are so many of us that are in the life boat trying to get to shore that do understand and do care. It's just our disease keeps us many times from getting out there with others that share the boat.


I send you internet hugs...the non hurting kind.


Love, Christina