survival mode

As I told Cindy this morning, I'm in survival mode. I never actually made bread the other day. And I need to do laundry. And (perhaps worst of all) I'm running on 6 hours of sleep. I've just been so...distracted. Just doing other things.

Don't get me wrong: it is a good thing to be distracted sometimes and let a few things slide. I am a believer in appropriate escapism. And right this moment, life is not particularly easy: I miss Chris. We are still doing our best to be (and become) the Christlike people we are meant to be, and trying to appropriately encourage each other in this effort. In my best moments, I feel really good about this. In other moments, I just worry. Not knowing for sure how things are going to go can really burden your heart, especially when the outcome matters so much to you.

With all that going on, I think it's good to spend some time just sort of...resting. I skype with Rachel, and play board games with my roommate, things I enjoy. What I do NOT enjoy, however, is staying awake until 3am and forgetting to eat and neglecting to write in my journal and letting my room get messy. These are the things that are the hardest to manage when I am struggling, and yet carefully managing these things makes the struggle so much more bearable.

I'm trying to find a balance between being gentle on myself and tightening my belt to handle the onslaught of temptation I'm facing. Because it is a temptation: to give up, to despair, to just throw my hands in the air and quit. Whenever we are at the verge of something amazing, Satan goes into overdrive and we're left asking, "What did I do??" (The answer to that is, ironically, "everything you should have." That's just how it works.)

Taking that into account, my main focus right now is just maintaining my spirituality. I go to church on Sunday, and to the temple on Wednesday. I study Conference talks and the scriptures. I pray, often. (Oh, and I helped Cindy unpack today. That was fun!)

I guess the take-home message of this is when life is hard, be as good to yourself as you can. Our dearest friends are the ones who give us hugs, dry our tears, and tell us it is going to be okay, yes. But they are also the ones who tell us to go to bed, bring us real food, and remind us to pray.

We have to be good friends to ourselves, too. We're never going to exist outside of our own heads, so we might as well learn to like it in there. So try something new -- try to forgive yourself for not being such a great friend.

Then, do better.