Enneagram

Yesterday in therapy we were talking about what feels compelling right now, what is sparking joy. Right now there are three things: the Enneagram, the puzzle C got me for my birthday, and decluttering and organizing.

A circular puzzle of a colorful tree mandala on a wooden background.

C and I agreed the other day that the energy in the house feels stale. Between the pandemic, C being so dreadfully sick for so long, the necessary accumulation of both healthcare supplies and everything we needed to cope, and us having relatively recently moved in before the pandemic hit, things need to be aired out.

It’s figurative, but it’s also literal. Books I’ll never read again, clothes that are no longer right, supplies for hobbies I once loved and doubt I’ll pick back up, papers I’ve moved through (at least) three states. Sometimes the best way to move energy is to move stuff.

As I told my therapist, so much of this felt like stuff I was holding onto because I wasn’t sure who I was, exactly, or who I would grow into. Now, though, I feel clear, and it’s time to make space for the person I’m growing into.

It’s fucking scary. I’m a person who learned early on to be malleable, to not hold too strongly to anything, for all kinds of reasons. And if academia was illegible to my science/business focused family, well, the Enneagram is entirely beyond their sense of the appropriate. These days, so much of my life, including our furniture (velvet! Bright colors!) is beyond their sense of the appropriate. They honestly don’t even know how much.

It’s scary to say “this, this is who I am” and have no exit. It’s felt safer to have an exit. But I’ll be 50 this year — it’s time to grow into myself.

I miss the blogging era. My Feedly feed is a graveyard of blogs I’ve loved that have gone dormant or disappeared, just in case they rise again and I get to hear how they’re doing.

Also, while I’m still on Twitter and likely will be to the bitter end (I block early and often and my feed is a delight of interesting and funny people), it’s not always the space I feel comfortable sharing in, especially after the recent shenanigans.

So here I am again, facing a new year. 2022 was better than 2021, although it would be hard to be worse. No one nearly died in 2022. No one was attached to a machine 24/7 in 2022. There were 0 EMS calls in 2022. I switched to a new role with less stress and fewer meetings and less need to work outside of business hours.

But even given the relative improvement, it was a hard year. I spent a lot of it unwell to varying degrees. We had what I suspect was Covid very early in the year, and I also was completely depleted from 2021, and for those reasons or others I’ve had more fatigue, less stamina, and more dysautonomia symptoms.

There were plenty of good things. My wife is substantially better than she was this time last year, and that improvement is continuing. Our marriage is better than it’s ever been. The ElderStatesCat turned 20 and is still with us.

The biggest thing that happened in 2022, though, was figuring out (at least in part) what some of my purpose is. I’ll be starting a teaching certification course on the Enneagram with my old teachers in January, and I’ve been immersing myself in studying in ways that are making me really happy.

But the fatigue has been persistent, if not exactly consistent, so my word for 2023 is vitality.

I’m not expecting myself to suddenly achieve the energy levels of a healthy person, although I’d welcome it if it happened. But keeping vitality front and center will help me think more about what supports my vitality, both in terms of wellness strategies and in terms of engaging with the things that make me feel alive.

So, welcome, 2023. I hope you’ll be a year I can look back on with more joy and less hedging.

Sparking Joy

2023: Vitality