It started with a pomegranate. At least, that's the way it seemed.
It felt like it was the pomegranate.
Being someone who's prone to depression, self-isolation, and bouts of apathy, I sometimes find it very difficult to... for lack of a better word... function. I sometimes find myself wasting hours either sitting and staring into space, or hopping back and forth between websites that have nothing new or interesting for me to read or see, just to have something (that isn't what I should be doing) to do.
And I spent most of yesterday doing just that. Sitting, staring into space, and wasting my time distracting myself. I don't do this because I want to. I do this because I simply can't find the motivation to do anything else. I don't like it. It pains me when I'm in those sort of moods, and believe me when I say I try like hell to pull myself out of it. And so, rather than try to jump back into my normal routine - as is my custom - after what did feel like a series of excruciating defeats earlier this year, I've resolved to take baby steps.
I've been trying to set smaller goals for each day and larger goals for each week and month. These little things - like making the bed in the morning or going for a run - help set me up to focus throughout the day and give me small amounts of motivation to keep going. But for whatever reason, over the last 2 weeks, I haven't even had the energy to complete even these small tasks. I ran on Monday. I cleaned the house. I did a small amount of work.
I had work at the wine shop yesterday morning, followed by an afternoon of errands, but when I sat down to get some real work done, I once again found myself unable to focus and fairly apathetic about it.
Now this is the part where I changed things up. After what felt like an incredibly unhealthy dinner, I decided I absolutelty NEEDED to put something whole in my belly. I'm a big fan of pomegranates, but I let the last one I had go bad because I was too lazy to seed it. (If you've ever seeded a pomegranate before, you know it's quite the pain-staking process.) But last night, I got off my butt and spent a good 15-20 minutes getting every damn little seed out of that fruit, sat down on the couch, and ate ALL OF THEM - the entire bowl of my yeild - as is my custom. Something about the process - having to work for my reward - clicked something back into place in my head. It reminded me that I AM capable of working hard for what I want. It reminded me that I have ALWAYS worked hard for what I want. I've always been the type to look a challange in the face and smirk as I then proceeded to crush it. Somewhere, sometime in the last 6 months, I lost sight of that. I remember now. That doesn't mean things will be easier. But it does mean they will get done. It means that I'm way too kickass to let a couple of stumbles break my stride.
So thank you, pomegranate, for reminding me that I'm way too talented to waste my time being anything less than everything I can be.