THE TIME IS NOW

I never pegged myself a "procrastinator" because I was always the type of person who got things done VERY far in advance. Whether it was college papers, trip planning, packing and even getting to the airport super early. As I've gotten older, however,  I find myself getting "stuck" more in thoughts. It's not that I still don't relish in my ability to get things done and get them done in advance. It's just that certain things draw me to distraction and sometimes I feel paralyzed with a thought.

Many famous psychologists call this obsession with thoughts "fusing with thoughts". The fact is, human beings, have a VERY large frontal lobe which is where analytical thought occurs. That's why it's so easy to get caught in a thought process where we can spend minutes, hours, days, months and even years, spinning on a hamster wheel. We are neither moving forward nor backward, just in a circle. And, therefore, we never get anywhere.

Dogs, for example, have a much smaller frontal lobe than human beings. Perhaps this is why dogs truly live in the moment. They live for the tennis ball or the frisbee; they forgive and forget; they miss us terribly when we're gone and they are always happy to wake up each morning because living is wonderful! (I am constantly reminded of this at work and feel blessed to spend days working with creatures that live in the moment).

Fusing with a thought leads to obsessing over a thought and we lose productivity in our lives. We all know this. So how do we take control? How do we stop hovering and start moving forward? The first step, at least for me, is awareness of the times I start fusing.  This awareness lets me literally jump off my hamster wheel of thought, get a of the grip of my frontal lobe and actually ACCOMPLISH something. Even if that accomplishment means being "unstuck".

So, today, I ask you, what is it that you've been "stuck" on and how are you going to DO something about it? Today, I am getting off my current hamster wheel (my hip hurts, my time trial bike doesn't seem to fit me, how am I going to get through this Ironman???) and DOING something I believe in. I am advocating for eating disorder awareness and recovery. I am posting on my blog in hopes that I can convince someone out there in cyberspace to donate to my cause and maybe yours too. Let's "de-fuse" together.