Reading and Realizations

I have this tendency to binge read. A few weeks ago I picked up some cookbooks because I was looking for different food and to prepare for my sisters cookbook club. I was also interested in Cameron Diaz’s Longevity book. I tend to dismiss celebrity books of all kinds, except for the occasional auto-biography. But an interview with here in a medical magazine discussed how she and her co-writer use genuine curiosity and interviews with doctors to drive the book and put it together. So I picked up both of her books. Tara Stiles has a new book on yoga and movement. I liked her previous one so I looked it over at the bookstore, then bought it. Lastly, my husband knows I like Shauna Niequist’s books. Her latest is also out and he bought that one as a gift.

As I’ve been going through these the past few weeks, I’m finding interesting intersections between them. SOme cookbooks are becoming more a memoir combined with recipes. The appeal is that they give a glimpse into a certain lifestyle or location. I had been reading Paltrow’s books our of curiosity because a friend had them and I tend to trust her judgement. But was I found was a brief interlude in the second book that talked about somatization, or the physical manifestation of pathological symptoms created by psychological circumstances. I had herd of the concept, despite my background, I tend to think of these types of syndromes as more a character flaw than real. This time, I felt more compelled to look into it than normal. I checked a couple of point of care tools that I have access to and got a good look at how real it did become. This made me wonder if I had started experiencing some somatization in the increasing, not well managed migranes I have been experiencing. Maybe yes. Maybe no. The only reason that I am considering it at all is because when I tracked my headaches last year, stress and lack of sleep were the two leading co-factors that tracked alongside.

Separately, I had been reading Diaz’s books. While the first was a enthusiastic presentation of biology and the overarching theme of connecting mind, body, and nutrition, the second is a tempered look at aging. To some degree, I feel that we need more books like this. I don’t have a strong female family group that proceeds ahead of me to pass down information and experience. I do not have a good mental construct of aging, partly for the social and cultural messages, partly because of family medical history. If find the book refreshing in Diaz’s encouragment of being informed and accepting. This book feels like a glimpse into a positive future I couldn’t have created for myself.

Stile’s book was n easy purchase. When I flipped through it at the store, what resonated with me was not so much that it was yet another yoga book, but that the emphasis was on ease. The idea that we should inhabit our bodies in the natural ways they move rather than battling them or asking them to constantly conform to certain ideals. She is careful to discuss that this doesn’t mean movement is easy, that there isn’t work involved. Instead, that we are capable of full deep connection to our body through awareness, movement.

In Present over Perfect, Niequist’s book, she discusses the transformation she’s made in her life. She called it rebuilding from the inside out, because that was the phrase that resonated with her from a mentor. I have all of her books. I’ve read each several times. Her voice in this one is different and reflects the changes she’s made. Her life before was a series of good things, but it made her busy, frantic, unfocused. It made basic choices in life difficult. I’ve only read through once, but I’m going to have to read it again because there is a subtlety that I didn’t get until nearly the end. It sounds cliche to talk about transformation from a busy life. There is more there, more depth in how important it is to be whole. How instructional jealously can be. What place true rest has in our lives rather than fake rest. And maybe, just maybe, we don’t have nearly the capacity that we think we do.

In the course of the month, getting bits and pieces of these books sifting through my consciousness, I’m starting to see how this all wraps up together. How I think I take care of myself versus what I actually do. The effect it is having on me mentally and physically. I find myself questioning the standards that I have been operating by, and not just the quatification (do I need to lower the bar?), but the origination of them. Where did I get them? I’m looking at the stress levels of my life and wondering less how to be more efficient, and more how to clear the decks. And the cherry on top has been listing to two lectures by Henry Cloud on stress, relationships, and connection. All of this can’t be a coincidence.

I’ve been working on my own transformation. Within the past year there has been a feeling, a seed thought that I need to change my life. It won’t be one of those burnout stories where I jettison all, take some drastic action, and the future will never be the same. But it will be a transformation. There needs to be. I see enough signs that I don’t want my life to continue as is. I feel less physically capable, less creative, less energic, and emotionally flat in too many areas of my life. If nothing changes, I can see that it will only get worse.

I already have a dietician and a therapist. And so the next part will be me taking an indepth look at my habits, wants, needs, relationships. I have hope. This is going to be good.