After spending some time looking at inspiring words on Pinterest, I decided to go out today, and even though my back is currently unhappy and I’ll be booking an appointment for a massage shortly, I’m glad I went out: the cool wind was nice and who doesn’t like sunshine? I always feel good after a walk so I don’t know why I resist it (though laziness comes to mind as a key reason). I’ll be going out at least every other day, preferably in the morning before work.

I was thinking about motivation today. I always think an outside motivating force is what I need, so when one of my colleagues who will be running the same race offered to run with me during our lunch break to motivate me, I agreed. However, I told her that because we’re at different levels of fitness (namely, she’s fit and I am not), we could walk out together, but I would prefer we go our separate ways. But guess what? I don’t like running at lunch time: the streets are crowded and even though I know no one is watching me I don’t like running with a bunch of people around. I’ll be setting myself up for success by getting to bed in good time and setting the alarm earlier than usual. I want my motivation to come from within.

Tomorrow I’ll tell my colleague that our Tuesday date is off…but I’ll also be able to tell her that I already went out earlier in the day.

Our Monday got off to a late start (I woke up just before 9am, and my partner in crime was having hair woes). Once Wendy got to where I was staying, we went to grab lunch (a delicious shawarma from Basha Middle Eastern Grill…yum yum) with Cynthia (my host), after which we headed back to Cynthia’s place to pick up my phone (yes, in my excitement I left my phone at her place!). Wendy and I took the subway to the Metro Toronto Convention Centre from there. When we got back on street level from the subway station, I asked a guy if he knew where the convention centre was and he asked if we were going to see Oprah. When we replied in the affirmative he laughed and told us we wouldn’t be able to miss the location because of the enormous lineup. He wasn’t kidding! The line went on for blocks and blocks and I wish I had taken the time to record it. We walked for ages before reaching the end of the line, and the number of people who joined the lineup behind us was staggering! We were in line for what seemed like a really long time (at least two hours). I’m a champ when it comes to waiting in line (remember: I voluntarily go to Black Friday and Boxing Day sales) but as I mentioned in my last entry (now with more minutiae!) I had recently developed some lower back pain. As a result even 30 minutes in line was too long.

Waiting in line

Wendy was a great person to be in painline with: she was cracking jokes and she’s just generally good-natured, so we laughed and engaged others in line. The line b-a-r-e-l-y moved for ages; it only started moving in the last 30 minutes or so. I had actually gone to buy myself a drink at Starbucks and when I came back to the line I found it had moved a few blocks and I now had to rush to suck back as much of my drink as I could before it was taken away from me (no outside drinks allowed in the convention centre!).

You could feel the excitement as we entered the convention centre and made our way to the hall: people were cheering and we started running (it really was like Black Friday sales!) and the staff kept telling us not to run. We had been told to keep our purses small and to be prepared for a purse check and security check. No outside food was allowed in the place (I had brought snacks with me because we had been told that there would be limited concessions for the 6.5+ hours that we’d be there and I knew I’d get hungry). Well, I guess they were running late or something because I and my snacks made it in without issue: there were no checks at all. I could have smuggled another person in!

When we entered the hall we were met with a shock: it was so FULL! As we tried to find a seat we were certain that the general admission seats which we had tickets for were closer to the stage than the section we were feverishly scouring for seats. We were wrong: that section was general admission. We were so disappointed with our seats! After grumbling a bit we accepted our fate and got settled. We joked that we were learning about forgiveness even before Lifeclass started!

We were so far back!

And then it started. Not the televised show—that wouldn’t start for a couple of hours—but the pre-show. All four of Oprah’s current pals—Iyanla Vanzant, Tony Robbins, TD Jakes, and Deepak Chopra—shared about 30-45 minutes of lessons with us on various topics. The goal of the pre-show was to fire us up and get us excited about living our best lives. It worked! I was trying to take notes at this point but between taking it all in and nodding in agreement and cheering, it was hard! As a result, my notes of this pre-show session are largely incoherent. We didn’t get to hear from Oprah before the actual televised show so that definitely made our screams of excitement genuine when she came on stage because it was our first time seeing her. She looked lovely in her green dress…and we were thankful for the large screens because otherwise we would have only seen a green blur on the far away stage.

During the commercial breaks Oprah engaged with the audience: she took off her left shoe to show someone who had inquired about her shoes. She answered a question about her score in Words With Friends, and she shared her average score and her highest score. People in the crowd were yelling to her and she was responding. She thanked those who went all out for the show, painting their toenails even though they knew no one would see it. She expressed her gratitude to us for waiting in line (she drove by our lineup after the first show ended!) and seemed genuinely humbled. At one point she said she’d come back to those sitting in the back so I was excited at the thought of hopefully getting a good picture of her.

The show was good. Wendy and I were disappointed when we learned the topic of the show was forgiveness, just one or two weeks beforehand, because we both felt we had a good handle on the concept. We wanted to learn something NEW. But not surprisingly we both had Aha! moments during the show.

You can actually see the show we attended online HERE. It was only when I watched the show from home that I realized even though we were seated far back, if we had been sitting on the other side we might have been captured on camera. Lessons learned!

TD Jakes and Oprah

Speaking of lessons learned, I’ve got an entry coming up on my other blog about those actual lessons. One lesson I do want to share relates to something I’ve shared before: the problems I’ve had with the elder of my two younger brothers. Someone asked the following on twitter:

How do you forgive a family member that you have to be in constant contact with. And though you forgive, the offense continues to happen. How do you manage that???

TD Jakes’s response was that you can’t forgive what you don’t understand. Understanding doesn’t excuse their behaviour or exonerate them, but it’s easier to cope if you know what’s behind the behaviour: maybe they’re an alcoholic, maybe they’re broken in some way. We can’t expect something that’s broken to function like its unbroken counterpart; this this applies to people too. Once you understand that, you must adjust your expectations to the capacity of the person. You can’t expect a person with a pint capacity for love to give you a gallon’s worth of love, for example. The world has gallon people and pint people and if you’re a gallon person you have to make sure you don’t have too many pint people around you or you’ll become frustrated. You’ll keep asking these people to give you more and they’ll resent you because they’re giving you all they can—which is true—but it’ll never be enough for you because you have a greater capacity than they can provide.

To relate this to my situation, I have to make sure that my expectations of Brother #1 do not exceed his capacity and I also have to make sure that I balance out his pint love for me with people who can give me the gallon love I desire. Thankfully, my family has other members who seem capable of giving me This.

Phew! This is a long entry! Thanks for reading.

I’ve had a headache each of the last three days which is unusual for me. I’m hungry but with the exception of last Thursday when I wanted a hamburger, I haven’t been able to put my finger on what I want food-wise, even though I’m hungry. I feel on the verge of tears first thing in the morning and in the evening before bed. Poor Jummy! :)

That’s my silver lining up there, a bible verse that was shared during a church service I attended a couple of weeks ago. A friend also shared this particular verse with me when I told her how I was feeling. I know the sun will come out tomorrow…or the day after, or the day after that. This is just a blip on my lovely life and thinking that way really puts things in perspective. And also, despite feeling like this, I’m so thankful that I have multiple things to smile or laugh about every single day. Some people have real problems that cast a shadow over every minute of their day. My problems are not so serious and I really appreciate that.

The answer is no.

I’m lazy and I resist anything that is hard or painful—unless it’ll save me money (not paying someone to design my sites is an example of this). It’s far easier to plead fatigue while doing 100s in Pilates class and rest than push through it. It’s easier to slow to a walk after a burst of running than to see what would happen if I forced myself to run just a few feet further. I’d rather eat as many sweets as I crave than deal with the uncomfortable feeling of wanting something that isn’t good for you in such large quantities. It’s easier to visit gorgeous websites and admire the graphic design rather than open a blank document and attempt to create my own graphic, even if I know will be inferior to the ones I was just admiring.

How do I shake off this tendency toward sloth? How do I become one of those people who work tirelessly to achieve a goal, who endure pain and exhaustion? I have a great brain, full use of every body part, so what’s my excuse?

I don’t have one.

Maybe this is what life coaches are for? Or maybe that’s just typical me, trying to avoid facing what needs to be done and just doing it.

Since Jov had her babies it’s been harder to make time to hang out and catch up with each other. Our schedules aren’t compatible: her nights leave her exhausted after a day of kid-wrangling while her weekends are full of kid-focused activities. My weekends are sometimes busy and my days are spent working. That’s why I suggested I find time to see them during the day and it worked well.

There was a time when it was difficult hanging out with Jov because so many aspects of her life represented things that I wished for myself, things I mentioned recently as thoughts of turning 33 have begun to dance in my head. The pain came not because I wanted to switch spots but because I wanted to be experiencing those things too. I really like how nicely things happened for her: she and her husband dated for four years and have been married now for six and a half years; they got plenty of dating life and married-without-kids life, which I always wanted. However, I’m certain that things happen for a reason, my time will come, and the way things end up working out will be exactly what I need. I plan to enjoy the ride in the meantime. I’m also glad that our friendship has withstood these life changes.

I laugh when I think of all the incomplete conversations we had yesterday. In fact, I need to send Jov an email to finish those conversations and ask her to finish some of the thoughts she started but couldn’t complete. We’re also planning a pedicure in the near future to give us some interrupted time and I’m looking forward to that.

Updated to add: the things I’ll remember are Mateja’s smiles, how well Luka knows Adele’s 21 album, dancing around in the living room to Adele’s Rumour Has It, playing pretend with Luka.

(Oh, and I don’t think my destiny is sugar consumption…that was a joke!)

I’ve been wanting to vacuum my house for two weeks. A couple of years ago, I inquired on Facebook about how late is too late to be vacuuming when you have a neighbour who lives below you and I think people had said 9pm at that time. In my head, over time, that shifted to 8pm (I actually love vacuuming; I just felt bad because the lady who lives below me is probably in her 60s), and given my tendency to get home late from work, the vacuuming wasn’t getting done. Saturdays would be ideal, but I was too busy sleeping in, washing my hair (really), leaving on the conditioner for an hour then rinsing it out, doing laundry, and slothing (not a word but it really should be) about to add anything else to my schedule. And on Sundays I’d head to my parents’ place after church so I’d get home too late to vacuum (if I didn’t sleep over).

Everything changed this past Friday: I got home (late, but before 8pm) and instead of unwinding (which can take anywhere from 30 minutes to “the rest of the evening”), I immediately vacuumed. And instead of doing the upstairs on Saturday as I told myself I could, I just did it all on Friday evening. And instead of telling myself I could do the laundry on Saturday like I usually do, I put in a load as I was going to bed on Friday night. And when I woke up frightfully early on Saturday (anytime before 11am is truly frightful, but this was before 9am!), I allowed myself to stay in bed until 9:30am but then I kicked myself out of bed, put that laundry in the dryer, did my hair routine and used that hour with my hair in a conditioning cap to clean my kitchen. It felt great, and even though this is a long weekend I already feel like I was extraordinarily productive.

As I look around my house, there is still so much that is out of place: papers need to be filed (doing that once this entry is complete), same with receipts, Christmas decor needs to be put in the storage room (ditto), and two of my succulents are dying to be transplanted (I really want to put this off but I have no good reason to, especially since I have two new, larger pots). By doing things right away, I’ll save precious brain space that I used to use to unsuccessfully keep track of my unending to do lists.

Win-win.

Life would be simpler if I didn’t want children. I’d still be incredibly impatient and grumpy for having to wait this long to be with my life partner (while so many others got to meet their mates in their 20s or earlier), but there wouldn’t be the added sense of panic that thoughts of my biological clock brings.

Of course I can have healthy children past the age of 35, just like there could be complications if I was under the age of 30, but it’s all about the odds when you’re past 35. Icky, possibly less favourable odds. My mom gave birth to Brother #2, her fourth-born, at age 33. I just did the math right now and that makes me feel like booing and hissing even more.

But enough doom and gloom. Unfortunately nothing I can do will make things happen faster than they’re supposed to happen. I just hope they’re supposed to happen for me.

This is my eighth year doing this “year in review” survey. You can check out my responses in previous years if you’d like: 2004, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2008, 2009, and 2010.

01. What did you do in 2011 that you’d never done before?
Drive my own car, go on a solo road trip.

02. Did you keep your new year’s resolutions, and will you make more for next year?
I don’t know if I made resolutions but I probably did and probably didn’t keep them (as usual). I will absolutely make new resolutions.

03. Did anyone close to you give birth?
Yes, Allison had Noah in September!

04. Did anyone close to you die?
One of my cousins passed away a few months ago and my mom’s cousin passed away a couple of weeks ago, in her sleep. I wasn’t close to either lady, but I last saw my mother’s cousin in 2008 when we visited Nigeria and I thought she was a really nice woman. When we returned to Nigeria in 2010 we dropped by her house but unfortunately she wasn’t at home. Both ladies died young; that’s always a sad thing.

05. What countries did you visit?
USA.

06. What would you like to have in 2012 that you lacked in 2011?
A fiancé.

07. What dates from 2011 will remain etched upon your memory, and why?
Maybe July 30, when I bought my car, and August 4 when I picked it up at the dealership.

08. What was your biggest achievement of the year?
Buying a car.

09. What was your biggest failure?
Not realizing my blogging goals.

10. Did you suffer illness or injury?
Aside from the nasty burn on my right arm from my Dad’s oven in Hammy, nope (thank God!).

11. What was the best thing you bought?
My car (goodness: we have a strong theme here!).

12. Whose behaviour merited celebration?
My parents and my sister. They were all so supportive of me this year. Also, my sister had some pretty big milestones this year (got out of her dead-end job, got baptized, and got an iPhone) so I’m very proud of her (and yes, getting an iPhone is a milestone because it really has changed her life, just as I predicted it would!).

I also have awesome friends.

13. Whose behaviour made you appalled and depressed?
Brother #2, a colleague, and the Canadian embassy in Nigeria.

14.Where did most of your money go?
Eating out? The car? My mortgage.

15. What did you get really, really, really excited about?
Paying my dad a surprise visit in Hammy.

16. What song will always remind you of 2011?
Someone Like You by Adele.

17. Compared to this time last year, are you:

happier or sadder?
Sadder, but only because this time last year I was pretty lovestruck.

thinner or fatter?
I’m quite sure I have more fat cells if I’m not actually larger.

richer or poorer?
Poorer.

18. What do you wish you’d done more of?
Exercising, cooking, learning graphic design, mastering WordPress, praying, having faith, reading (including in particular my bible).

19. What do you wish you’d done less of?
Eating sugar-laced products (same as last year).

20. How did you spend Christmas?
With my family. We opened our gifts after dinner (a first!) on Christmas day, I enjoyed Boxing Day shopping solo, and I slept over at my parents for most of the week after Christmas (this latter part is the same as last year).

21. Did you fall in love in 2011?
Nope.

22. What was your favourite TV program?
Oprah’s Lifeclass.

23. Do you hate anyone now that you didn’t hate this time last year?
Nah, though there are a few people that I would like nothing more than a nodding acquaintance with.

24. What was the best book you read?
Hmm, I didn’t read many books cover-to-cover but Crush It by Gary Vaynerchuk was good.

25. Who was your greatest musical discovery?
Adele.

26. What did you want and get?
A car.

27. What did you want and not get?
This fella I like to move here.

28. What was your favourite film of 2011?
Something Borrowed I think.

29. What did you do on your birthday, and how old were you?
I turned 32 and went for lunch and dinner with friends the night before, and dinner with my family the day of. I also decided to intentionally celebrate my birthday moving forward.

30. What one thing would have made your year immeasurably more satisfying?
Having a boyfriend who lived in the same country as me.

31. How would you describe your personal fashion concept in 2011?
“I wore clothing”.

32. What kept you sane?
My family and friends and remembering to give thanks (same as last year).

33. Which celebrity/public figure did you fancy the most?
None. I don’t fancy celebrities or public figures.

34. What political issue stirred you the most?
I remain politically apathetic, just like last year (and years previous).

35. Who did you miss?
This fella who’s in Nigeria, K.

36. Who was the best new person you met?
No one comes to mind.

37. Tell us a valuable life lesson you learned in 2011
I’m still learning this but I think my dad is right when he said I have to make sure that I don’t let setbacks prevent me from continuing to pray and hope for things with all my heart. If I let something that’s important to me slip off my radar as a coping mechanism, I may discover that I’ll successfully trick myself into thinking I don’t actually want it. I do this because I want to protect myself but I need to stop trying to prevent myself from feeling all the emotions that come with wanting something badly, not believing that I can actually have it or that I deserve it, and dealing with the related setbacks that can and will occur on the path to getting my heart’s desire.

38. Quote a song lyric that sums up your year.
No song lyrics really sum up this year.

- – -

And that’s it for another year! Give this survey a try if you’ve never done it.

I swear more nowadays. I can blame my city’s local bus system for that, and remembering all the times that the bus sped past me or the bus driver ignored me as I ran toward it is enough to bring up that old rage (and my constant wish that I had a brick to toss at the driver). Driving gives me the occasional road rage moment, so I guess I swear most when I’m in vehicles (or trying to get into one). The swear word of choice is the F word, directed toward the driver. I will use (or think) the B word or A word (B!tch or A$$hole) about people when they say or do something that bugs me to no end. And if I forget to do something that I was supposed to do, or mess up something colossally at a critical time, the S word will come flying out. In fact, I think I say the S word more than any other swear words. I also swear more when I hang around people who swear. I think I do it to fit in or something. I don’t like this.

Aside from those swear words, there are words that growing up in a Christian household, you just don’t say, like g.oddamned, J.esus C.hrist, oh my F word God, etc. For some reason saying oh my God has always been ok with me; not sure why though. When I hear those other three I cringe, because to me they’re not random swear words; they’re an insult to my beliefs. Do I think the person using those swear words is thinking that for a minute when using it? Absolutely not! In fact if they were swearing at me they’d be more likely to use the B- or A-word rather than “taking the Lord’s name in vain”.

One of my old pastors shared a story about how he used to call anyone who was acting weird a drunk, so he’d say “You drunk!” all the time to his friends. After a while one of his friends told him she found that insulting because her father actually was a drunk and hearing it brought up unpleasant memories for her. The same with the use of “You retard” or similar: if you have someone in your life with physical or mental challenges, those words might hit a soft spot within you.

Although I’m not big on swear words, they exist and in my opinion they should not be used at the workplace or socially as much as possible. I understand that with friends or in a more casual setting they will come out but in company where you don’t know how others feel about use of those words, it’s best to avoid it. Despite this, I’ve sworn at work, in the presence of colleagues who are friends, granted, but still.

I don’t want any of my friends who come across this entry to think it’s a passive aggressive message to them, because it isn’t. I’ve been thinking more about swearing in the last while, and I’ve realized that while it bothers me to hear God- or Jesus-related swear words, I’d feel hypocritical suggesting to someone that they can say certain swear words in my presence but not others, especially since my reputation as a non-swearer is no more. Also, both sets of swear words (those related to religious figures and those that aren’t) are being said for similar reasons so I don’t know if actually a difference, and growing up we were taught that saying another word instead of an “accepted” swear word (such as saying “fudgesicles” instead of the F word) is just as bad as swearing, because it’s just replacing the word you really want to say.

I know I’ve been talking a lot about making life changes and given my track record nothing might stick but I really do want to go back to those days where I was known for not swearing. I’d rather be a problem solver who takes productive or constructive action than one who blurts out an expletive. Obviously no one is perfect and I’m not saying I’ll never say another swear word but one pro I just thought of is not having to train myself not to swear in the presence of my future children!

Over the past almost six years, I’ve banked my vacation days so I could spend four weeks at a time in Nigeria. I did that three years ago and also last year. I haven’t taken a week off to stay close to home, doing what my heart desires, in a long time and I need it. My soul needs it.

We’re heading into a busy time at work, so it’s tempting to wait until that time is over before taking time off but I don’t think I can put this off. I feel like I won’t get through that busy time in good spirits unless I have a moment to recharge my batteries. I’ve therefore submitted my time off and plan to spend the next few weeks organizing my workload to make the week off as stress-free as possible. Perhaps knowing this lovely treat is on its way will give me the concentration and efficiency I’ve been lacking.

Tentative plans for the week off include watching as much Private Practice as possible, working on a new website, and unpacking the boxes in my storage room, but if I don’t do any of those things and I come back rested, that will be ok.

Summer will be over in a few short weeks and when I look back on the summer of 2011, I want to be able to remember that blissful week where I took time for me.