ok, I can go along with the escaping theory when you describe it that way. I don't think I am trying to escape by engaging in new things now. I can see how disengaging, as I have done, can be seen as escaping.
<How do you plan on ending that pattern?> The one thing that hits me regarding this is that in the past I didn't know that I was doing it. I just didn't see that I was disengaging. Now I see it, I see what I was doing - it took a brick to hit me but now I see it. Ok, well, I sat down a few months ago and made a list of all the things I had "wanted" for some time but didn't go after and just started working on them. I've noticed that is has been hard at times to continue, which is probably why I haven't done them in the past. I've used a number of techniques but there have been two that seem to work the best. The first is accountability to myself. How I do this is every morning after I get up I look at myself in the mirror and ask myself if I am getting closer to the goals I set or farther. I've found that when I am looking at myself in the mirror, I mean really "seeing" myself I am unable to lie to myself. This was a good strategy because seeing myself in the mirror every morning is not something I can stop doing. I have to take a shower, I have to brush my teeth, the mirror is too big, I am unable to get around seeing myself. And when I see myself all the goals on my list just pop-up in my mind and I know in a moment if I am actually working on those things or faking it - it's hard to lie to myself. I have many other techniques to keep up with the individual goals - just one example is having a scale in the bathroom. With it there I can't help but standing on it to see my weight, and once I see my weight I am either gaining or loosing - if I am not gaining than I know I am not moving towards my goal.
These things force me to be engaged.
Oh, one other thing I use is my friends and family. I tell them all the things I am trying to do because they keep me accountable. They ask me how it's going. They can see if I'm gaining wait. Heck, the gym even calls me if I don't show up for a few days in a row...
<What types of things are you doing now, that you have been wanting to do for a long time?> I've mentioned these but I'll list them explicitly: -I have really needed to gain wait. I determined how many calories I need to gain about a pound a week and am using a spreadsheet to keep a daily calorie count - 4000 calories a day. -I am taking online college courses to expand my experience -I have reconnected with my family -I have made new friends -I go to the gym 4x/week and can see the results on my body -this is a big one - I changed my epilepsy meds and am going to take my driving road test so I can start driving again - this will give me so much more freedom to do more things
I think those are the major ones for now.
One off's...well, reconnecting with my family was one thing I guess I wanted to try on for size but it turned out to be cool and now I'm going to have to up my cell minutes because it. The others were all things that I really wanted - but when you're not engaged it's no easy to just not...
