(Personal) Choices

It’s that time. Best of the year lists are popping up all over the pop-culture and entertainment blogs. Books, movies, TV shows, art installations, plays and musicals, even memes are being reviewed so we can try to make sense of the past twelve months. We spent how much time obsessed over that back in February? What really were the best things ever last year, now that we’ve had time to temper our breathless enthusiasm? What are we actually embarrassed for even liking at this point?

2015 was a big year for me, personally. I made the decision to speak up for causes that I’m passionate about in ways I never had before, and that opened up connections to folks online I’m so glad I got to make. I’ve shared my perspective as a gay black Buddhist who spends a lot of time pretending to be a jackalope online, my experience with my mental illness, my opinions and fears about telling stories. I’ve stepped into black geek, social justice and furry writer spaces, and I’ve found that those communities are homes I’d been searching for all my life. It’s been a transformative time.

I’ve had to change, personally and professionally. At my day job changes in ownership and company structure forced a shift in my position, and I found myself learning technical skills that have always frightened the living shit out of me. Months later, that fear is still with me — but I’ve learned how to make peace with it. I know how to use that discomfort to sharpen my focus, to be careful, to pay attention to what’s necessary. The lessons I’ve learned from that experience I’m trying to apply to the rest of my life.

December is upon us, and we’re all making one mad dash through the last holidays of the year. It feels like we’re rushing through a time that we should be taking slow; the days are short, the nights are long and cold, well-built for silent contemplation. I’ve spent so much of my life letting my reflexes take over how I act on what I think and feel. If fear motivates my behavior, I’ve often let it with no questions asked. If anxiety demands comfort, I indulge in it. So many of my actions have roots in an automatic stimulus. I feel x, I do y. It didn’t matter for a long time that these reflexes no longer serve a useful purpose, or worse, hold me back. I use them because I’ve always used them.

I’ve been making a persistent effort to live deliberately. I’ve become more consistent with my meditation, and taking the awareness cultivated on the bench throughout my day. I’m still new at this, though, so I fail quite often. When I’m overwhelmed force of habit reasserts itself and I fall back on those same ingrained behaviors. But I’ve gotten better at recognizing when I end up on those tracks, stopping for a minute to ask myself if I want to be there, and repositioning myself when I need to. As with everything, it’s a work in progress. But progress is being made.

Everything we do throughout our lives is a choice that we’ve made. It can be difficult to take stock of our options and pick the best one, especially in the many moments that make up our days. Emotions demand action, we’re often pressed for time, and our emotional reflexes have been well-honed. But it’s helpful to double-check whether they’re still useful after a certain point. We’re often in situations where our first response — our reflexive one — doesn’t fit, and it’d be better to go with something else. It’s hard, slow work to do, but that awareness pays dividends sooner than I thought.

I’ve learned a lot more about myself this year. Learning about how my anxiety is on a fairly sensitive trigger helped me realize all the ways it influenced my decisions; I’m now working on consistently short-circuiting that system to make smarter choices. Learning that I have issues with ADHD has allowed me to recognize that there are certain things my brain will just never be good with. Far from simply letting myself off the hook with that, it encourages me to work harder (and more efficiently) by knowing I need to rely on something external instead of my own brain. Timers, to-do list and calendars have become essential; follow-through is not something I’m great with, so finding ways to make sure I finish what I start needs to be baked into every process. In this situation, knowing my limitations hasn’t made me feel lesser; it’s allowed me to work within and beyond them to do a lot more than I thought I could.

This year has been great. I’ve made a lot of progress, and I feel I see myself and the world around me a bit more clearly than before. But there’s still work to do. I can be better still about how I manage my time. I could be more efficient with my projects, work through them more quickly by making sure I’m on task when I’ve set myself to be. Learning to be comfortable with my fear and anxiety is never something that will end. It’s a project I’ll be working on all of my life. But the work becomes more familiar with time and practice. Maybe it won’t be easier, but I’ll get better at it.

And working on the connections that I continue to make will be a big focus next year. Now that I’ve finally found and understand community, working hard to be a productive part of them is something I really want to do. I want to support my neighbors, both in the real world and online. What are the best ways of doing that? How can I help through my perspective and experience? What can I do to help us be better?

I’m so grateful for this year, even though it’s been difficult at times. I’m thankful because it’s brought me closer to so many of you. I’m really looking forward to the work of continuing what I’ve started here next year. I’m really looking forward to helping bring us all closer together.