It’s good to be back in the driver’s seat, creating all sorts of interesting things on the web. For a while, my thoughts were all over the map and I did not think forward.
I haven’t been able to write any blog posts for the past wee while because I‘ve been dealing with a nasty wound on my leg.
It really knocked my socks off (quite literally) and refused to heal for far too long.
As the wound worsened, I became more worried and found myself lost in the weeds of scary “what if?” thoughts.
Now, that’s a thinking swamp to avoid at all cost.
My spirit dropped to the basement. I didn’t call friends, email or do much of anything.
As a rule, I am a chin-up kinda gal, but this health bump really got the better of me. I wanted to snap out of it but wanting did not cut the mustard.
So I started to pay attention to my thoughts and saw how they triggered my emotional feelings.
A big fat buried fear kept floating into my thoughts. One that involved a memory of a doctor saying he hoped I would not lose my feet in the future due to the extent of my circulatory difficulties.
Shocked and angered, I’d tossed him, and his opinions, right out the door, years ago.
Yet, here I was, wondering if his version of my future was presenting itself through this nasty wound.
Thinking along these lines caused me to feel shaky and tearful.
I hate feeling fragile, and, yet, I know only I can heal my emotional state. And I know that I can do that by redirecting my thinking.
So whenever the “what if?” thoughts arose, I would force myself to ignore them and focus on whatever I was doing at that moment.
Just having a thought doesn’t make it true.
And the more I caught myself – “Oh, there’s my thinking going off again”, the calmer I became.
Something about calming down lifted me up.
A scooter ride in our neighbourhood yesterday evening put this all into perspective for me.
A boat in the distance caught my attention. I found myself soaking up the interesting view and no longer paying attention to driving my scooter. I didn’t notice I was too close to the edge of the road.
Guess what happened?
Luckily for me, help was not far away and a disaster was avoided.
Lesson learned: Think forward and pay attention to what’s right in front of you.
