Exceeding Expectations

We are by all means a nation of overachievers.  We work, work, work until we can't possibly work anymore, and then somehow we find it within ourselves to keep going.  If we don't have a nervous breakdown first. 

A lot of overachieving stems from the workplace.  You know how it is....you want to prove yourself to the boss, or be the golden child of the office who can do no wrong, or you plain and simple just enjoy going the extra mile time and time again.  

But how does overachieving play out in our everyday lives?  When does too much literally become too much?

Take for example a normal day at the gym.  For me this includes some cardio, maybe a circuit of weights, and some ab exercises just for good measure.  I get to the end of my set of crunches, lie back on the mat, and think to myself that I should go ahead and do at least 10 more.....just to really push myself.  

Okay, nothing wrong with a few extra crunches you might be thinking.  And let's face it, I could probably use them, but why do I feel the need to add even more onto an already full workout?

For whatever reason, most of us are not completely satisfied with ourselves unless we exceed our expectations.  It's not enough for us to simply reach a goal, do a task, and be done with it, we want to take that goal or whatever it might be to the next level.  

Since the first of the year I have made a point to make time in my schedule to write.  I don't always get to it every single night, but a good four nights a week I am down in my office clicking away on the keyboard.  Some nights are more productive than others, that's just a given with writing.  But on those nights when I only pump out five instead of 10 pages, I actually feel somewhat disappointed in myself.  As if I have failed at something or not given it my best effort.  Those are the times when I have to kick myself mentally and remind myself that as of a month ago I wasn't writing nearly as consistently as I am now, which means I have made great strides in just a matter of weeks. 

But you see what I mean?  It's hard to celebrate the small accomplishments, or even the fact that we did what we set out to do.  There is this ingrained sentiment that we must do it to the max each and every time. 

I suppose not everyone thinks this way.  But for those of us who do, I think we need to remind ourselves from time to time that underachieving is something to be celebrated.  Sometimes it's worth cutting a few minutes off your workout to go home and spend time with family, and even though it doesn't always feel like it, that pile of work sitting on your desk probably CAN wait until tomorrow.  We don't need to berate ourselves for not being perfect, for not being able to do every single little thing that comes our way.

There's nothing wrong with making progress in small increments.  And yet it's hard to let go of the mindset that everything we are working for can be achieved all at once.  There's a thought.....exceeding expectionas and instant gratification.  A connection, perhaps?  

Would you be friends with Jessica Fletcher?

If you happened to be watching TV at anytime between 1984 and 1996, you more than likely stumbled upon an absolutely delightful show called "Murder, She Wrote."  In the show, a small town widow turned bestselling mystery writer, Jessica Fletcher, helps out local law enforcement from around the globe by solving some of the most baffling of murder crimes.  She also pumps out a few books along the way.   

Jessica Fletcher is like your grandma.  Only much, much cooler.  She writes, she travels, she cooks, and she constantly proves she is smarter than most of the police officers in America by solving crimes that these so-called cops and detectives have been professionally trained to do.  Pretty bad ass, am I right?

 And still the question remains: who in their right mind would befriend this woman?  Because no matter how many different ways you look at it, the fact remains that when Jessica Fletcher is around people seem to have a much higher possibility of not just dying, but being murdered.  But maybe we shouldn't hold this against her.  Below, I have compiled a Pros and Cons list to consider before signing on to be BFF's with Mrs. Fletcher. 

Pro: A reliable exercise buddy.  Most noticable in the first season of the show, Jessica is constantly being shown on camera in exercise attire.  She runs, rides her bike all over Cabot Cove, and spends a lot of time sweating away the pounds out in her garden.  If you've been looking for someone to get in shape with, Jessica is your woman. 

Con: She is smarter, and makes more money than you.  If you are one of those people who has to be the center of attention in your group of friends, who has to be the smartest, the prettiest, the richest, then you probably shouldn't spend much time with Jessica Fletcher.  She will always, always outsmart you, even if she acts like she has no idea what is going on.  Plus, she is a bestselling author with an endless supply of book ideas so you know she will always have more stashed away in the bank than you could ever hope to earn your entire life.  So between the books and the murders solving her face is always going to be plastered in newspapers, bookstores, magazines, maybe even Times Square.  All those with jealousy issues need not apply.

Pro: She will always defend your honor.  Jessica is a true blue friend.  She will go to the ends of the earth for you and back....as long as you're not a cold-blooded killer.  If you need to know anything about Jessica it is this: she will stick by you to the bitter end, defend your name and your honor to the police, and work tirelessly until your good name has been restored.  Hey, that's just the kind of thing true friends do for each other. 

Con: You will always be a murder suspect.  Okay, so this ties in with the pro that was just mentioned above.  Unfortunately, one of the downfalls of befriending a woman who always is around when people are being killed is that before long, the police are going to turn a crooked eye on her and all her friends, no matter how many people she helps put behind bars.  Which means that it's only a matter of time before the police will drag you off to jail, as you stare helplessly at Jessica through the window of a police cruiser, silently pleading with her to solve the crime in time enough for you to make it back to work and not have to explain to your boss that you missed half the week because you were rotting away in a jail cell in a small town no one has ever heard of.  I personally would give Jessica a pass on this particular con as long as it only happened once.  But repeated occurrences would force me to seriously consider the benefits of this particular friendship. 

Pro: Lots of spontaneous travel.  If you spend your days living and working in the quaint, small town of Cabot Cove, Maine, chances are you will need to escape every now and again to remind yourself there is a bigger world out there.  And who better to escape with than your rich, generous, bestselling author buddy?  Jessica travels a lot.  She has probably travelled the entire continental U.S. and selected parts of Europe.  Who's to say she wouldn't love to have a travel companion every now and then?  If you're up for visiting some exotic and not-so-exotic locales, and doing a bit of amateur sleuthing along the way, you and Jessica were made to be pals.        

Cons: People are going to die.  Lots and lots of people.  And somewhere along the line, one of those people could be you.  Hey, I'm not trying to cast a dark shadow over your potential new friend but her track record should speak for itself.  So go forth and make friends....if you dare! 

Am I housewife material?

My friend Pam and I had a most interesting conversation over the holidays.  We were discussing life, which inevitably led to discussing work, which inevitably led us both to the same conclusion that we are tired of working for other people and would like to just be able to go out and do our own thing.  Or, we would like to be housewives.  

Now friends, please do not get all super feminist on me and decide I am a traitor to females everywhere.  Because that is truly not the case.  And please do not roll your eyes and jump to the conclusion that I am just too lazy and too unmotivated to go to work everyday and be productive.  This is also not true....most of the time.

If we are being honest with ourselves we will readily admit that we hold a very strong stigma against women who don't work.  We will think bad thoughts about them (not really, really bad, but just kinda bad), and we will call them lazy and not smart enough to go out and establish a decent career.  We might call them golddiggers, and we might assume that they just lay around watching TV and gabbing on the phone all day.

But deep down, we also secretly want to be them.

Who wouldn't want to have that kind of freedom?  That kind of possibility?  Who wouldn't want to have that kind of time available to tap into your hidden potential and essentially find out what it is you really want to do?

Because being a housewife isn't just about cooking, cleaning, and folding socks.  Well, okay maybe that's a small part of it, but there is also the notion that you have to get involved with things in order to keep from going crazy by yourself in the house all day.  This means time to volunteer, time to help others, time to try new things and open up doors that might not be accessible because of your 9-5 work life.

I suppose it's also a bit of a selfish career path.  You know, the whole part about expecting someone else to go out and make money and support you while you just hang out around the house, walk dogs at the Humane Society, and maybe meet your friends for lunch once in awhile.  Yes, I can see something a bit selfish in that mindset.

However, I'm willing to bet that I'm not the only one who harbors this secret fantasy (which I suppose is no longer a secret).  But you see, women are not supposed to admit this to anyone.  We aren't supposed to be content anymore with being homemakers.  We are supposed to want to play with the big boys, climb the corporate ladder, and hold important positions with long elaborate titles.  So....what if we don't want that?  Are we traitors to the women's movement?  Or are we just honest?

However, if the women's movement was supposed to be about choice, why do we pass such harsh judgement on certain women who choose to be homemakers, who choose to stay home and raise their kids?  Do we find them to be "less than?"  Does the fact that they shampoo the living room rugs on Monday morning instead of attend a staff meeting make them somehow beneath women who work?  

And the thing is, being a housewife is not easy.  I don't personally have any experience (yet) but when you think about all the different things that have to be done to keep a house in order, it adds up pretty fast.  And if one happens to have children, this multiplies the duties by about 100.  But people love to make the argument that if they can work, raise their kids, and take care of the house then everyone should be able to do it.  I believe this ties into the idea that we feel everything in life should be "fair."  If I have to work, then she should have to work.  We don't want anyone getting through life easier than we are. 

We were all made to do different things, and we are all good at doing different things.  When I was working at my very first full-time summer job my supervisor told me that she didn't think I was made to work in an office setting.  She said I needed more freedom to do my own thing.  Was this a compliment?  Some sort of in-depth analysis?  Or was she trying to tell me I was doing a really crappy job filing invoices?  Looking back, I think it was a mix of all three.  (And on a sidenote, I absolutely hated that job). 

Some women were made to excel in the corporate world.  Others are more adept at chairing volunteer committees and holding fundraising bake sales.  Neither of these attributes should be frowned upon.  

I have no doubt that I have been judged up and down as you have been reading this post.  In truth, I've been judging myself a little bit as well.  Nobody wants to be guilty of endorsing gender stereotypes, but I can't help it if my dream job entails cooking, cleaning, and volunteering.  Hey, I know it's tough work, but I think I'm up for it.   

Is there such a thing as too many shoes?

When I discovered the show "Sex and the City" I was instantly addicted.  Wow, that's a shocker isn't it?  If you haven't been living under a rock for the past ten years and happen to know even a little bit about the show, you probably know that the main character, Carrie Bradshaw, is obsessed with shoes.  And not just any shoes, but designer shoes that go for $300 and more a pair.  Not a cheap obsession. 

Of course, Carrie was also a newspaper columnist for most of her life which meant that having the liquid funds available to purchase outlandishly priced footwear was sometimes difficult, if not impossible.  But she always found a way.  Isn't fiction fun? 

When I started watching Sex and the City I wore sneakers just about every day of my life.  I can't even think of a pair of footwear I owned that didn't have shoelaces, aside from the proverbial black dress shoes that everyone's mother insisted they own until they were old enough to move out of the house.  But something happened to me once I discovered SATC.  Maybe it would have happened regardless, but this show awakened something in me that I never had thought about before. 

A love of shoes. 

A love of stilettos, and wedges, and pumps.  A love of darkly colored suede and bright, funky patterns.  Shoe shopping became a new favorite pasttime.  Zappos.com became my new favorite website.  I suddenly found myself transforming my style.  I was no longer content with my tomboy attire on a day-to-day basis, I was ready to create outfits and top those outfits off with my new favorite accessory:  fabulous shoes. 

Here's a newsflash for you.  Shoes take up a lot of room in one's closet.  Because you see, there are two of them.  So after awhile it takes a lot of creativity and superior organizational skills to make room for all those shoes.  Luckily for me, I now live in a house and have access to more than a couple closets in which to store my treasures.  

But no matter what I do, I can't get people to stop asking me the same question over and over again. 

"Don't you have enough shoes?"

Boy, that's a brain teaser.  I suppose to some people I probably do have enough shoes, more than enough, even.  But to me.....I just can't endorse the idea that the footwear I currently own is all I will ever need. 

What is it about shoes that is so wonderful?  I mean after all, these things go on your feet and inevitably get sweated in and eventually become rather smelly, dirty.....you know the deal.  Suddenly these brightly colored contraptions aren't as appealing as they once were. 

For me, certain pairs of shoes encompass different attitudes.  I have pairs that make me feel bold and in-charge, other pairs that are more subtle, others that are flashy and just scream "PARTY!"  Then I have my workout shoes, which I actually love just as much as any pair of heels I have ever owned.  With the right footwear, I can be exactly the person I want to be and convey exactly the type of persona I want to convey.  Pretty sweet, huh? 

New shoes are like new possibilities.  And, okay, they're just downright fun to buy.  And I will rationalize everything to death in order to convince myself that a new pair of shoes must be purchased.....today.....this very minute.  Closet space be damned.  

So to answer the question, no, I don't think there is such a thing as too many shoes.  I don't think it's silly to pack four pairs of shoes when I go home just for two nights, and I don't think that limited closet space will ever stand in my way of purchasing the most perfect pair of black stilettos (that I have seen this month). 

I have been told numerous times that life is all about choices.  Now wouldn't it be a shame to go through your life, making those choices, and wearing the absolutely wrong pair of shoes?

Think about it.       

Do I watch too much television?

I go home at lunch most every day to let my dogs out.  Every afternoon I walk through the front door, let the dogs out of their kennels, and then turn on the TV.  At night when I get home from work, if Dean hasn't already done so, I will turn on the TV.  When Dean and I crawl into bed at night the TV is always on until we fall asleep.  On the weekends I will usually dedicate at least a few hours to house cleaning, during which time I have the TV on.  Not necessarily being watched, but on nonetheless.

I have been watching TV since I was a little kid.  So have a lot of people in this country.  However, I feel like I watch more TV now than I ever did when I was growing up.  Does anyone else feel this way?  When I was a kid, I had so many other things to amuse me, so many other things that I spent my time doing, TV wasn't really one of my top priorities.  From a child development standpoint I guess this is a good thing, but I'm wondering why TV has become so much more a part of my life now.  Is it because I don't have as much outside stimulii?  Or am I becoming lazier?

It's true that spending hours in front of the TV is often construed as being lazy.  But TV can also provide one with a sometimes much-needed escape.  From work, from a fight with your spouse, from just about anything that might be weighing on your mind.  And let's face it, sometimes we need an escape, or at least a couple hours of distraction before we let oursleves sink back into reality.

Also, as much as I am absolutely in love with Netflix and the fact that they have hundreds and hundreds of movies and TV shows available on instand download, I admit that it has definitely contributed to my inclination to flip on the tube rather than turn on the radio.  Come on now, how awesome is it that in a matter of minutes I can access the entire first season of "Friday Night Lights" and watch it as long and as many times as I want?  (On a side note, has anyone ever noticed how much beer Tim Riggins actually drinks on that show?  The boy NEVER has a glass of water!)  

I guess the one thing that confounds me more than anything is my habit of having the TV on even if I am not watching it.  For instance, during my weekend house cleaning I am upstairs, downstairs, running the vacuum, doing dishes, all sorts of activities that do not involve sitting on the couch and paying attention to a particular program.  And yet the TV is on, the volume is up, and I in turn am wasting electricity all for the sake of background noise.  

Even in the mornings when I sit on the couch and read.  I am engrossed in a book, paying attention only to the words on the page, and the TV is still on.  Some people might find this a distraction, but I'm very good at tuning things out.  That and multi-tasking....perhaps this is an example of both.

Here's my question.  Why are we (because I'm sure I'm not the only one) so inclined to watch TV even when we aren't watching TV?  What is it about that box with the startingly clear picture that keeps us coming back for more, even when we should be doing other things?  Is it more than wanting an escape.....are we all addicted to TV?

I will sometimes force myself to not watch TV.  To sit and read a book in total silence.  To turn on my iPod when I am cleaning.  I find it refreshing to take a break from TV, to force myself to become creative again in the ways of entertaining myself.  It's like I want to prove to myself that I still got it, that I don't need TV in order to be occupied.   

Of course, this can only last so long.  Because when I see those new episodes of "Glee" scheduled for Tuesday nights you will find me right back on the couch. 

Life is short....turn on some Christmas lights

Perhaps you have noticed the new look that "In My Words" is sporting.  Yes?  No?  First time visiting?  In any case, I was feeling restless with the old look and decided with the new year fast approaching an aesthetic layout change was in order.

Today Christmas is on my mind.....and all the things that go hand-in-hand with the holiday.  Not just the shopping and the giving of gifts, but more specifically the decorating.  Think of all the things we do for Christmas.  We run out and buy live trees to disply in our living rooms, we cover these trees with ornaments of every size, shape, and color, we hang up string of lights in our windows and outside our houses, then on top of everything else we buy all sorts of other decorations to display inside our homes.  Decorating for Christmas alone can sometimes last from the day after Thanksgiving right up until Christmas Eve.  And for some people that still isn't enough time.

Before I get too much further along let me say that I love decorating for all holidays.  I may not have the largest decoration collection, but I make do with what is available.  Of course I am also extremely cheap, which is probably a good thing in some respects, but it also means that it will take me awhile to grow my various decoration collections.

My husband doesn't quite get into the spirit of all-out decorating.  Especially when it comes to the Christmas lights.  He argues that it isn't worth a more expensive electricity bill just to have some colored lights on our house.  Okay, so in realist terms that is probably true.  But I can't buy into it.  For me, Christmas lights, tree, decorations, and everything else are essential. 

Decorating is an element that helps make any holiday more than average.  It sets the scene and amazingly enough can set your mood.  Once all my decorations for Christmas were appropriately displayed, the tree assembled (yes, it's fake) and decorated, the lights hung and plugged in, I felt darn good.  Every night when I come home at 5:00 and it's already pitch black outside, I see my Christmas lights shining bright and feel a little happier inside.  When I'm in my house with my candles burning and illuminating the nativity scene, I can't help but instantly relax.  Sure, part of it is probably the essence of the season, but there is something to be said for WSU Santas and fat snowmen smiling down from the TV stand. 

Is all-out decorating what Christmas is all about?  No.  Is it essential to having the perfect Christmas?  Probably not.  But for some, and for others who might not like to admit it, decorating in any way shape or form just has a way of elevating spirits. 

Would I trade these happy feelings for a lower electricity bill?  Nope.  Sometimes it's worth it to plug in some Christmas lights.    

Monday's OMG Moment.....

The OMG moment of Monday came when my sister and I were strolling through the WSU Bookie, searching the new release book tables for potential Christmas presents.  And that's when I saw it staring up at me.  The book that made me stop dead in my tracks and say, "Oh. My. God."

In case you haven't heard of this upstanding young man before, it is none other than Mike "The Situation" Sorrentino from Jersey Shore.  That's right kids, The Situation has infiltrated your local bookstore to regale you with advice on the following topics:

• How to creep on chicks
• How to avoid gernades (FYI: not the ones that explode when you pull the pin and throw them)
• How to get your GTL on in the Jersey Shore

I think I died a little inside seeing this book on the same table as a biography on George Washington.

Of course, as the saying goes, everyone and their dog has a book out these days.  Literally every reality TV star eventually makes their way into a Barnes and Noble store, and the majority of those "stars" probably had someone ghost write their book while all they had to do was pose for the cover photo.  Let's face it, if they let The Situation actually write his own book one would probably need a translator to decipher all the crude, obscure references.  

So as I sit here and ponder my own future in the land of writing, I can't decide if this book bodes well for my chances of one day being published, or if it represents the low I will have to sink to in order to see my words in print. 

Perhaps that is a question best pondered on another day.