Dear Taylor, I'll tell you why

Dear Taylor,

While I admit, I am completely in love with the album Red--I'm kind of depressed about your love life (which you can review... here and here... if you're getting fuzzy on the details, side note: you should have dated Tebow).  Oh and here are the more recent exhibits:

 

You get a lot of flak about the whole crash and burn love life thing, which makes me sad, because I think there are so many women who go through this. I am glad that these relationships end because obviously they aren't working out... still, there are some things you should know.

You are an awesome person. You are talented, smart, funny, beautiful... so why?  Why do you go through this (all the time!)?

I'll tell you why.

You're not picky enough.

You're flattered too easily.

You don't believe in yourself.

You feel like if you don't go for this relationship there might not be another one.

You're insecure.

To put it in a nutshell, you're selling yourself short.

So get pickier! You're the one in control, don't wait to see what creep is going to come knocking next!  The more confident you are, the more you love yourself, the less you'll accept any and every bit of attention that comes your way.  Don't worry about hurting feelings, this is your life, if someone asks you out that you feel slightly skeevy about--RUN! Yep, the other way.

Believe in yourself, you are worth it.  And if someone really likes you, they'll work at getting your attention, you don't need to throw yourself at anyone... and if they are going in for a kiss on the first date... (as in you don't really know them yet) they are just in it for the action. They should be more interested in getting to know you than making out.


So, basically, hang in there. Get to know yourself.  Figure out what you want. Love is hard and life is hard, but I'm sure you'll figure it out--just start learning from the mistakes now, not after the next five crash and burns.

Good luck,
Red


P.S. I get what you say about needing your independence, but obviously you like being in relationships, so um, you're just not dating the right guys.

Here's the exact quote if you think I'm putting words in your mouth: "Independence is something I've always needed, from when I was young," Swift stated. "But I love the idea of romance and falling in love. I've never really had a long relationship. So that's something I think about for the future. It's an interesting part of my personality: Part of me just wants to be alone..." It's from some magazine called VIBE, I've never read... also it's AAALLL over the internet.   

P.P.S I think it's great you write about all your relationships, because that's where good music comes from--LIFE.  So please don't cave to the pressure, sell out, and start writing super generalized songs that are lame. But... it is time we get a few more happy ones in there.

P.P.P.S. I'm so not missing the Red tour, I promise.  I even stuck it on my bucket list.

Loving things you don't.

I had to take a health class in 9th grade.  It was completely run of the mill don't do drugs, always eat healthy, exercise this and this amount, etc.  Honestly, I don't remember a whole lot from it.

Here is the one thing I remember.

It was a story.

(Got that teachers? Stories stick.)

My health teacher said when he was in high school he played soccer.  He loved soccer, but unfortunately during off season all they did was run.  Running was boring, it was hard, it was stupid.  He hated running. His  teammates hated running.  In fact they would curse and generally repeat how much they HATED running on all of their runs.

Sounds kind of typical high school to me.

But anyway, their coach got a little sick of it, so he outlawed the cursing, he outlawed the word "hate".  He told them whenever they wanted to whine, they just had to say:  I love it.

The team laughed at him, like pfft yeah right, but after a little coaching, even just to make fun of the stupid suggestion, they would say it.

When the sweat was rolling off their foreheads as they were pounding the burning hot pavement uphill, someone would shout: I LOVE IT!

Then the chorus would break out, they all LOVED it.  They said it like a swear, but it was a good way to make fun of their coach and they kept doing it.

And then a strange thing happened... the more they said it, the more they joked about loving running... loving the heat, the sweat, the muscle cramps, the more they actually did...

They loved it.  

I used to really hate doing the dishes, and even though it took some strategizing  on how to make this easier, it also had a ton to do with attitude.

I read these suggestions on how to like doing house work, one of the suggestions was to do a fist pump in the air and yell: GIVE ME A HELL YEAH FOR THE DISHES!

This wouldn't exactly go over so well in my house, because then I'd have a one year old and a 4 year old screaming H-yeah!

Anyway, all this was to say... you can change how you feel about something by the words you use, by your attitude.

So go pick something you "hate" and give "lovin' it" a whirl.

There really are secrets...

So turns out, there really are secrets to keeping your house clean.  I read a blog entry one time that stated the exact opposite, it was like all that's between you and a clean house is hard work, there are no secrets... anyway, it said something like that.

And I felt so depressed because I was like... I do work hard! All day, everyday!  And I can't keep my house under freaking control! It's impossible.

But I've found through a little research/observation (from the Internets/watching the habits of really clean people I know), that it's all about working smarter, not harder... hence the secrets.  Okay they may not seem like miraculous secrets to you, but to me, they have made all the difference.

1. Don't let the dishes mildew.  

• This sounds so stupid, but it's true, I always hated doing the dishes, but that's because I'd continually let them pile up until they had to be done. And I loathed it. So now, I load the dish washer all day after every snack/meal/etc, run it over night and unload as soon as I can in the morning.  Doing this has changed my life.  

2. Do a load of laundry most days.  

• The more people we added to our family the crazier the laundry situation got.  Laundry day was super lame and usually ended with a HUGE pile of laundry on the coffee table that would stay there for days at a time until slowly, it got used up.  I try to do a load a day, this doesn't always happen, but if I do a load most days, it stays under control. This means much smaller loads, that are way easier to put away... It took me a while to be converted to this tip, because I didn't want to be constantly doing laundry, but I found out I spend way less time/energy/angst over laundry now than I did before.  

3. 5 minute clean ups.  

• I set my timer for 3, 5, or 10 minutes and my kids and I do a cleaning blitz.  I try and do this before nap time and before bed time so the toys don't get out of control.  Also another tip I learned from some article was to always take something with you when you leave a room.  You see a toy or two on the floor that don't belong in the kitchen, pick them up as you walk out and throw them in the toy box... it can make a big difference.  

4. Declutter

• This is my arch nemesis, but I'm getting better, you just have to remember the less stuff you have, the easier it is to pick up/keep organized.  Picking something to declutter for 15 minutes a day is also life changing.  I love taking a box or sack full of weird stuff to the Goodwill, it just makes me feel lighter.  

5. Schedule

• Have a cleaning schedule for stuff you don't do as often... here's mine:  Monday-vacuum, Tuesday-wipe something down (this is usually weird sticky stuff my kids get on walls/cabinets/chairs, I pick one thing and don't worry about the rest), Wednesday-mop, Thursday-Grocery day, Friday-Bathrooms, Saturday-catch up on whatever I didn't get done.  
• Have a daily cleaning routine, for when you load/unload dishes and/or clothes, declutter, do your chore--like vacuum, etc.  And do the cleaning as fast as you can, get it over with, and move on with your life.  

So a lot of this I learned from flylady.net, but I didn't go overboard and buy all her books or even sign up for her emails.

The fly lady has a ton of awesome suggestions, that I'm sure if I followed them, my house would be immaculate, but I'm not the fly lady.  Part of my routine involves exercising, writing, playing with my kids, reading scriptures/meditation time... these really are the most important things in my day... consequently I'm not going to swish my toilet bowl every morning, because I just don't care that much.

You have to pick what's important to you.

Is my house perfect?

Nope.

Is it clean enough?

For me, yes.

So there you go.  What other secrets have you found?

Loving it, come heck or heck water

Pretty much when New Years rolled around I decided it was going to be the year of the 'suck'.  My whole family was really sick, my husband and I didn't even remember it was our anniversary the day before because we were alternating lying on the couch with chills/snot/the works and/or making frequent trips to the restroom.  We put the kids to bed at 8, we went to bed between 9:30 and 10...

And I just kept thinking about why everything was going to suck this year.  About how hard certain aspects of my life are going to be... about how my husband doesn't have a job right now--and it's making things a little tense around here (that may be a teensy understatement)... about how he is still going to school... about our student loans growing... about getting up all night with a newborn... about taking care of two other kids... about not having enough help around the house... about the uncertainty of whether we are going to have to move across the country to find a job... and the list goes on.

Then I remembered something.  It was this talk I heard, called Of Regrets and Resolutions, about what people regret as they approach the end of their lives.

It talks about how people regretted not spending enough time with their loved ones and how people felt like they didn't live up to their potential... these made sense.

And then the last one was:  "I wish I had let myself be happier".

And I wasn't expecting that one... it kind of stopped me.  Maybe it's just the way it's worded, not 'I wish I'd been happier'... but "I wish I had let myself be happier".  That little 'let myself' makes a big difference.

"So often we get caught up in the illusion that there is something just beyond our reach that would bring us happiness: a better family situation, a better financial situation, or the end of a challenging trial.

The older we get, the more we look back and realize that external circumstances don’t really matter or determine our happiness.

We do matter. We determine our happiness.

You and I are ultimately in charge of our own happiness."

I am in charge of my own happiness.  So if I decide it's going to be the suckiest year on record, it will be.  If I decide to get over it and enjoy my life even when things are crazy and hard, I can be happy.

So I've decided, this year is going to be awesome.  It is a blank word doc ready to be filled, and I get to choose how it's filled.

I am determined. Come heck or heck water... (that's how my family says it, I know, we're weird) I'm going to be happy.

I've posted this quote on my fridge.

"Come what may, and love it."

So here's to a HAPPY new year and to loving life.
 
-Red

Believe it or not, this isn't even the Love it story I was going to share... I'll have to get on that later.

I have a blog?

I keep getting subtle reminders that I'm not blogging... like all the bajillion spam comments that keep getting emailed to me.

I pulled the old thing up and realized how much I liked blogging.  And how cute my short hair was... sigh.

So here's a life update for ya...

1. I have two crazy kids, a 4yr old and a 20 month old.
2. We are having another baby in the springtime.
3. My husband is still going to school and had to leave us for three months.*
4. Big girl started Prek this year.
5. I'm growing out my hair for various reasons... one of which is that my face fills out when I'm pregnant, and the other is that my husband begged me day after day after day... to grow out my hair--we shall see how long it lasts.  I get this itchy feeling every so often that I need to chop all my hair off.
6. It's just been a lot of big changes.

I've been writing occasionally.
Exercising more than writing.
Eating healthy.
Cooking from my crockpot.
Learning how to keep my house under control, or at least attempting it.
Surviving the kids being constantly sick.
Getting through the holidays without too many meltdowns (my own, not the kids).
Trying to keep things in balance without wanting to rip all my hair out.

So it's time, I don't want to make this blog a headache, or have a schedule, or feel obligated to post about certain things, but I miss it.  I miss venting, or sharing, or making a record of my life.

So while I'll probably still write about writing, I had to change the title of my blog.  Because I'm pretty sure I'll be writing more about life.  And how I'm trying to love it.

More on that later.

Red

*Single parenthood SUCKS. I do NOT recommend it. And I seriously admire anyone who has to do the task alone, because it is reeeeeaaaaallly hard.