Avoidance.

This weekend, while busying myself with cleaning my apartment and making plans for the week, I realized something pretty significant in my motives to get organized. While I convinced myself that I was being very productive and making good use of my time, I was avoiding a bigger task that awaited me: weeding through my conflicted emotions. All week, a whirlwind of questions have been flying around my mind and my emotions have been bumper-boating around my heart. Yet, the moment I have some down time, I choose to Swiffer. Really?! 


Often times, I use cleaning to avoid confronting more important issues, such as contacting someone I've been reluctant to reach out to, or journaling about my buzzing thoughts to gain some clarity. In the moment, I tell myself that I will feel just as satisfied and fulfilled if I, for example, do some tidying up around the apartment or take the time to paint my nails. When in reality, I'm just sweeping (hah) the most important "task" under the rug and will continue to trip over it until it's attended to. There are of course times when things like cleaning are merited and I am indeed in a peaceful mental state to enjoy doing so. But when I use mundane tasks and band-aid tactics to cover up the real issues I'm facing internally, it only causes further emotional turmoil. 

There are plenty of things we all do to avoid taking some "me" time for ourselves to check in and ask those heavy questions. After knowing what it feels like to be completely open and self-aware, I figure out pretty quickly when I'm playing an avoidance game. Ask yourself what you do as your quick-fix avoidance mechanism, and find a way to confront the reality of what you really want. For me, I like to blog about my feelings, share them with friends or mentors, or just do a stream of consciousness journal. That often allows me to get to the root of what's going on. Learn how to get in the face of your problems or questions instead of sidestepping them. Easier said than done... but it CAN be done. Avoidance may seem like the easy solution in the heat of the moment, but the resultant build-up is anything but easy or enjoyable to deal with.

Be the hero in your own life. xo