Category: Balance

Mid-Life Crisis… Here I Come!!!

    K Ghislaine

Ok, drama queen alert. I know, I know. If you’ve been reading over the past year, you may have already figured this out as my posts have been more introspective, and of the variety of trying to improve my outlook on things. Hey, it’s what it is. And considering that there is an entire term for what I have been feeling, I don’t think I am alone here, even though the reality is that I feel very much alone, well at certain moments.

Here’s the thing, I thought that I had it pretty good. I had a job that I really loved, and a side hustle that brought me so much joy. When the brewery closed though, things got a little murky. So, I dug deep and wrote a book. Great! But, in today’s climate the best case scenario is that it gets published 2 years from now. Yeah, I have lamented about this before. So, sorry to any regular readers, I’ll get to the point, I feel the career mid-life crisis weighing on my very soul.

So, what brought this all to light? A few weeks ago, I had an interview for a retail management job that I am over qualified for. I answered each question, as if I had been doing it for years. I was flooded with memories of managing a team of women, the hard to please customers, the sales aspects, and the constant nagging of head office to provide all the numbers that honestly in retail is so often beyond your control. I left that interview, defeated, and almost sick to my stomach. Why in the world did I put myself through that 50 minute ordeal?

Just because you can, doesn’t mean that you should. And that, is the crux of it all, figuring out what it is that I should be doing. And well, I have known it all along, but making the actual push and sacrifice to do it, has never been possible, or I guess practical. And it’s still not. It feels like an indulgence, but a very expensive indulgence, and I am uncomfortable that it has taken me so long to say out loud, that getting my full education is worth it. That I am worth it.

If you follow me on social media, maybe you’ve seen this months self love challenge. I have it on Bluesky, but also my lesser known accounts on IG and Facebook for Breaking Away Coaching. It is here, that I am humbly reminded just how important the relationship with self is. And that this relationship needs to be nurtured from time to time. And in this case, it’s time that I give myself a few credentials that will really make me feel like the person I know I want to be.

So, here I am, reminded that the relationship with self, is just as important as the relationships with others. And well, it took writing 2 out 3 on Medium to really get this crisis ball rolling. Ok, fine, the ball has been rolling for a long time, I just have been my stubborn self who wanted to find a solution that didn’t feel like investing in myself, and thereby putting my life on hold.

Thank you all for the likes, shares, and comments which is the best way to support this blog, oh and subscribing to my Patreon!

Reminding Myself to Choose Happiness

    K Ghislaine

I recently wrote a post on Medium about Falling in Love with a Narcissist, and no, it was not about my current relationship. After I wrote it, I felt this deep sense of uncertainty, which is odd. Normally when I write to the heart of an issue I feel like a weight is lifted. I walked away from the keyboard, and just felt numb. And then, I realized, I had been feeling numb for a long time. A few month ago, I became irritated with myself for being so vulnerable, and decided that I needed to toughen up. It’s a pattern I go through, be soft and fuzzy, then shut that down when it becomes too much.

This teeter-totter is just who I am. That being said, finding myself in a state of numbness is not ever my end goal. And so, here I am, reminding myself that I need to choose happiness… again! Life will never not be complicated, and I currently have the strongest support system that I have ever had. Being grateful is a choice, and so is being happy. I have the power to choose I real emotion that adds value, and I do not have to shut off my emotions. LOUDER for the voice inside my head telling me I need to be strong!

I could blame the people of my past for forcing me to be strong. For telling me I was only loveable when I was confident, and for trying to police the emotional swing that is quite frankly a natural part of being a woman. We have a cycle. It comes with hormones. This is reality! And I am speaking up, that this does not make me weak, as I once believed. Oh what a fool I was. So many thoughts flash through my mind, as tears well up. I’ll save unpacking how this affected my libido for another time. Because ooph, that’s just something I am not quite ready to touch.

But back to choosing happiness. This month I wrote on whiteboard a phrase that seems kind of silly, but, I think that’s why it has been helping: Light as a feather, stiff as a board. When I was a child it referenced a game whereby you chanted this, and then with a group of friends, lifted someone up by fingertips alone. It was a powerful phrase that soon was banned by our parents, for reasons we didn’t understand. Today, I am using it as a mantra to remind myself to be lighter with things like stress, burdens, and the intense pressure I put on myself to succeed. But balanced with being stiff, resolute, and confident, because I am not hollow, or of need to chance who I am. Just to be kind, and reasonable.

Great things are coming, and good things are already here. And no matter how much I bitch and moan, challenge is a part of my life. I need to look past, and choose happiness. Light as a feather, stiff as a board.

For access to all my paywalled articles and bonus content, please check me out on Patreon (it’s like giving this little writer a tip and I’d sure appreciate that!).

Week 6: Humility

    K Ghislaine

Last night, I had a dream that I finally was able to do the splits. It’s something that I have wanted to do for a long time, but, have never really put in a solid effort to accomplish. In the dream, the trick was to do front splits, instead of side splits, and presto, I was able to spread out with ease. Dreams are funny that way. They often make connections for me, that my waking brain simply never can. The lesson is that sometimes I have to approach things from an unconventional way in order to achieve what I want to. And this little anecdote brings me to this weeks writing prompt, which is humility.

Agatha Christie writes about trying to emulate your writing hero, only to realize that one must in fact find their own way to go about things. The prompt further challenges the writer to look deep into what our strengths, and weakness really are. By digging deep into where you can grow, and where you excel, you ultimately will find your voice. The thing of this is, as I am sure with almost every creator out there, focusing on the areas that need improvement is easy, whereas, understanding or even acknowledging where you shine? Well my friends that is where the difficulty lies.

Can you actually create if you feel humility? If you are at the top of your game, knowing that no matter what you put onto the page, canvas, or whatever medium you choose, will be amazing, is there value? Or is it better to always be a pained and struggling artist? Is that where the heart and sentiment truly lie? I don’t know the value of ever writing with humility. Perhaps if that victory is ever achieved, it would be time to teach young minds about the craft that I hold so near and dear.

There is a part of me, that struggled with doing this women’s writing challenge because I didn’t want to change who I was, nor how I wrote. In fact, that fear, has probably kept me from doing a lot of things in life. Failure, is difficult for me to accept. Which brings me back to my dream. I know, that changing my point of view is something I am very good at doing. What I am not so great at, is the stick-to-it-ness. When I keep banging my head against the wall with no results, it eats away at my drive to continue. But here I sit, knowing deep deep down, that my writing strength is that I keep writing. And as evidenced by my many years blogging, the writing, it has actually improved a great deal. Perseverance is my writing strength as much as my nemesis.

And, yes, my ability to try new things. There, a tinge of humility has escaped my lips. I am very good, at absorbing new information, listening with all my facets, and changing or amending my opinions. And that my friends is what makes my writing what it is, something many of you enjoy reading. While my fear keeps me from actually giving up, hence not admitting to myself that I may never do the splits and therefor if I stop practising daily then I can’t actually fail. Maybe that’s a stretch in logic (pun very much intended), but hey, my perfect counterbalance to being so flexible (I can’t stop now) is by me not putting wasted effort into things that I might never achieve.

Welcome dear friends to my convoluted brain when I task myself with something bigger than I have the mental capacity to currently handle. A mishmash of thoughts, and ideas flow out of me, and if I let my stream of consciousness do the leading, this, is where we end up, with Intuition and Logic, the post I struggled with last week and said I don’t do. Ha! In actual fact, that last paragraph was my way of knocking myself down a peg after admitting that I was really great at something. Maybe just maybe, I have always written with a humble nature, and that’s what makes me relatable at times. But then again, maybe not.

For those following along on Patreon, yes, there are some behind the scenes pictures on there!!! Enjoy and thanks for the support.

Writing the Hard Stuff: Book Lament

    K Ghislaine
Stretch

One of the things I pride myself on is being able to write in an authentic way, be it good, bad, or just weird. The thing about this book writing part though, is it’s even tougher, and has brought me to tears more often than I ever thought possible. Yesterday, I actually wrote myself a little motivational cue card in hopes that reading it would help, with my book writing lamenting.

For those who don’t know, I am writing a memoir of sorts, of my experiences in non-monogamy. There are a lot of words written, and it is so close to being done, however, there this internal struggle with being real about how I experienced things outside of monogamy, and not wanting to be all doom and gloom. That decade was hard. It was filled with challenges, and there are days that I lament the fact that I felt so alone exploring it. There are so many wonderful people that I met, and such incredibly hot moments, but looking back, it took a lot out of me.

I was not experiencing things in the manor that made me feel safe, cherished, or even loved. And that is difficult for me to rectify. With that in mind, I don’t want my book to read like a horror story (OK that is being really dramatic and it’s not even close). Instead I want it to be an adventure story, that cherishes all the incredible things that happened, but, I just can’t tell that story, because it is not authentic.

To balance things out, I have started a few posts on Medium that aim to share what my takeaway is on the complexities of love and what each relationship norm or not norm can bring to the table, in Love Explored (Which you can purchase a membership via Medium directly, to explore so many amazing writers!). Writing this helps ground me, to be able to look towards the possibilities and the lessons I wish I got to experience first hand, far more often than I did. That decade of my life, forever changed me, and I’m so glad it made me a more loving and accepting person, rather than the biter and angry individual it very easily could have.

I’m trying to be brave, authentic, and articulate in how I remember my life. I hope that’s what my finished product shows. I really, earnestly do. But, I suppose that will be in the eyes of the reader to discover, when it is finally finished. It’s the big push to work through these hard emotions, and I thank each and everyone of you who have offered encouragement, listened to me babble things out, and who have joined me for drinks or bought me beer. Soon….

Stop Preying on the Vulnerable

    K Ghislaine

No Means NO!

Dramatic Big Cliff Photo for Effect!

I shouldn’t have to have my guard up when I am being vulnerable: And yet, here we are again.  A lot has happened in my personal life over the past month or so, and in order to understand it and process, I write about it. Yet, without fail, when I show the slightest vulnerability, my DM’s get flooded with personal messages from strangers asking if I’m OK. If there is anything they can do, and wishing that they lived closer so they could hug me.  Reality check here, that is predatory behaviour.  Do not think for one freaking second that I do not know what you wish me crying on your shoulder would lead to. As always, no means no!

I make my only presence clear, that I do not like private messages, especially from strangers.  There is no grey area to this.  I am perfectly clear, and repeat myself every few months. And yet, here I am, dealing with something intense and finding that I have to have my guard up against douchebags, preying on my vulnerability.

(Affiliate Link)

I am so freaking done with that behaviour.  So done.  Like beyond done. I deserve to show my feelings in a safe space.  I demand that.  And if you don’t accept that, don’t follow me. But ask yourself first, why you think my feelings and clear demands for consent are not valid to you.  Why do you think you get to supersede my clear words?  Why is it that you believe you are an exception?

Yeah, you’re not going to like that answer if you actually think about it.  Why?  Because, you will find that you are the quintessential “all men” that you probably hate hearing about. Sorry, but I am not sorry! This is ridiculous how many times I have to state the same thing. I should not have to constantly demand respect, not should any other woman.

Yes, I post sexy photos.  Yes, I write about taboo subjects, and absolutely if you follow me on Twitter you will see that I don’t hold much back.  I am real, bold, and proud of who I am!  None of these things should make me a target for dick pictures, lewd messages, or thinly veiled openers to “get inside my private space”.  I am quite comfortable in the public sphere, and believe me, I can handle the majority of people.  What I cannot abide are those individuals who believe rules don’t apply to them. That is a garbage take, and I want you out of my life… right MEOW!

Here is a list, for easy reference of a few other times I have ranted about this, while I sit here baffled that I have to type this out again:

Consent: Why is this Not Getting Through?

Human Beings Have a Right to Say NO

No Means No

Saying No Can be Difficult as a Woman

If you have written anything on this subject, I welcome you to add it to the comments section of this post, or on social media. I will be retweeting all of the articles in hopes of getting through to someone out there who needs to hear this. For those rare individuals who want to atone for bad behaviour of the past, please share this post (after reading a few articles and what others have had to say), and then feel free to buy me a beer via my Patreon!