lamest blogger ever

Not only haven't I blogged, I really haven't meditated.  After my last post I meditated every day that week, just about, but then life just took over.  I am under some crazy deadlines for work.

I'm still trying to observe myself, which is not the same thing as mindfulness I know, but it is perhaps a precursor to it.  I feel that I have figured out a great deal about myself, what gives me anxiety in my stomach that feels like I've been punched and won't go away.  I have figured out some of the unhealthy behavior I tend to do in response to this feeling just to try to make it go away.

It sounds silly but one of the things that has helped me to do this a lot is a period calendar app that I started using a few 3 weeks ago.  So for example, when I have wrenching anxiety and my iphone tells me "6 days left," I can convince myself that hey, a portion of this is just hormones, and whatever stupid thing is bothering me right now is probably a red herring.  This knowledge itself doesn't make the painful anxiety subside, but it has been somewhat effective in preventing me from doing or saying something inappropriate in the interim.

I still have intentions to make a legitimate effort at daily formal meditation - I just need to figure out how.  It is difficult to work anything into my schedule that doesn't come naturally to me when work is so crazy.  Everybody says work is crazy, so it seems to have lost its meaning.  I wish there were something more compelling I could say to portray the absolutely frantic pace of my life right now.