The Dance of the Do-er

When I was six I entered into the amazing world of education.

 Oh yeah, buckle in folks its going to be one of those kind of stories.

I started kindergarten as everyone does: decked out in my barbie gear, hair perfectly ratted on top of my head with a gigantic bow, (shout out to the 80s-90s moms who did this to their poor children!) and my sweet Velcro strapped shoes. I remember clinging to mom begging her not to leave me with all these strange people but then I spotted the crayons and soon warmed up to my fellow snot monsters and life went on.

Kindergarten is an interesting time because you aren't really doing anything different than you did at home, you just have new people in charge of you and more people to share stuff with. Its like a test run to see if you can handle actual humans that don't share some DNA with you.

Luckily, for most of us, we make it past kindergarten and were shuttled right along into first grade.
Now, this is when the game changes on you. They throw this thing at you called homework, and you have to take it home and do it. WHAT IS THIS GARBAGE? They try to jazz it up with pictures and fun scenarios, but the actual work part is super annoying and leads most kids thinking: BRING BACK THE COLORING DAMMIT!

And from then on you become one of two people: "the do-er" or "the dancer".

The do-er is the kid that goes home with his homework that is supposed to take him an hour. He sits down with his glass of Sunny D and his homework takes him the predetermined hour.

The dancer is the kid that goes home with her homework that is supposed to take her an hour. She sits down with her glass of Sunny D, does one problem and then decides she wants a snack. She eats her snack and then sits down, does another problem and then decides that she needs some music because it "helps her focus". She then does another problem, and realizes that she forgot to take her shoes off. On her way back from taking her shoes off she decides that the current hit on the radio is just too dang catchy to not dance to, so she dances her butt off until the song is over. She then does another problem, and eventually its 8:00 and her homework has taken her 5 hours.

 Now, if you haven't already figure out which of the two you are, let me explain. Just like most things, there are gray areas. You can be both and some days you can switch back and forth between the two if you try hard enough. However, you will always present more strongly as a do-er or a dancer. [I'm a scientist so you can consider this scientifically proven ;)]

Me? Can you guess which one I am? :)

I have been the dancer my entire life. I have tried with all my might to force myself to be a do-er and its just never stuck. It would take me hours and hours to do my homework because I would dance my way through it.
Luckily for all of you, I haven't changed. Its now 11:58 as I write this and I am supposed to be in bed snuggled up to that guy I love some much, dreaming about normal ranges and critical values for the chemistry test I have to take tomorrow.
And I dance on..

The point is this, if you know how you are, own it.
I dance my way through stuff, but I eventually get it done right and on time, and in the end that is all that really matters.
Other people work better by powering their way through stuff and get it done fast, right, and on time and then they feel like they can dance.
 The important thing to remember is that its okay to do things on your own time because if we were all the same, the desks or dance floors would get really crowded.. and the only thing worse than sharing your crayons is not having enough space to dance.

--Shlog

Ch- Ch- Ch- Ch- Changes.

Changing our minds, I do it all the time. While most people would just chalk it up to me being a woman I like to pretend that I do it purposefully every once in a while. Ya know, as opposed to doing it just for fun.

Changing my mind ranges anywhere from switching between what T-shirt I want to wear, to driving my Tona crazy when he asks what i'm feeling for dinner. However at this moment in time, those minor changes seem quite insignificant to what I've had brewing in my brain.


Anyone who has talked to me in the last few years about what I want to do with my life has heard a very long description of my plans. I was, for a very long time, confident in my choice to go to medical school and NOTHING was going to sway me, I was ready. AND THEN.. life. I realized very quickly after spending the majority of my time at school buried in books, that I really wanted a life to go along with this amazing knowledge.

Now understand my dear friends, this is not an easy thing to write about. My poor little ego is screaming with horror at this very moment that I even considered changing my mind. BUT the other part of me is excited about possibly having the best of both worlds.


You know those Chinese finger traps you played with when you were a kid? I felt like my career self and my family self were jammed into either side and the more I pulled one way or the other the more stuck I felt. When you are in the moment of questioning your already planned out life, you get a serious pang of panic and fear when you realize that you actually might not know it all.


Surprise, Surprise..


This is when you turn to your family. My family is the most supportive group of crazies you will ever meet. Dayton is my biggest cheerleader and he even looks good in the outfit, (haha just making sure you are still paying attention) but really, he is amazingly supportive. They all helped put things into perspective and let me realize that I don't have to give up one part of my life for the other.


So, for the moment I have decided that I want to be a Physicians Assistant. This will cut my school time in half and allow me to spend more time with the people I love.. maybe even having my own little people one day. I said ONE DAY mom.. don't go buy me baby crap.


The take away from this post is that if you are in the conflict with yourself, prioritize. Figure out what you want from life, and go there. You won't be giving up on yourself, you will be giving yourself the gift of choosing a different kind of happiness. And that is a good way to change your mind.


In closing, I part with one of the greatest quotes I have ever heard by the Dalai Lama when asked what surprised him most about man,"Man, sacrifices his health in order to make money. Then he sacrifices money to recuperate his health. And then he is so anxious about the future that he does not enjoy the present; the result being that he does not live in the present or the future; he lives as if he is never going to die, and then dies having never really lived.”


Live in your life. Be there for the things that matter to you. Changes can be good, even if they are scary.
--Shlog

Starting A Blog..

So, starting a blog... not really something I saw myself doing. That being said I usually have a lot to say about a lot of things, as most of you know, so it makes sense that I ended up here. I'm not sure how many people will even read this but it is a good outlet for me to vent, HELLO CHEAP THERAPY! The good news is I know I will have one fan (hi mom!) because even when your artwork sucked as a kid, she still thought you were on a fast track to The Louvre.

SO, Here goes nothing!

On any given day I have about 10-15 things bouncing around my head at one time but for the sake of your sanity I will only limit this particular post to a few, one of us should stay lucid right?
On my mind lately is life. Now if you have made it this far into this post you are sitting there thinking "Wow Ashley how very unique and deep, what a beautiful thought" in what I hope is the most sarcastic tone ever because that is literally the most general thing I could have said, but in all seriousness I can't say it in any other way.
I have been thinking about life and what an interesting thing it is. As homosapien's we are programmed to question things. We question if we really should eat those leftovers that have been in the fridge since.. well we aren't ever really sure. We question if we really like that shirt we have had in our closet that we have never really worn but refuse to give up on. We question why sporks are only ever used by KFC and why you even need a spork to eat a drumstick? (no? just me.. okay..) We question why we keep scrolling through Facebook when we have already seen that post about the Powerball 1 billion times. We even go as far as to question why we keep going to that job that we hate every day. WE QUESTION EVERYTHING. The good news is, we should. We should question those leftovers, that really ugly shirt, the spork, that annoying facebook post, even our big life decisions. If we don't stop wondering, questioning, we wont figure out the important stuff. We won't figure out that eating those leftovers will land you on the toilet for a good two hours.. (hope your TP is soft!). We won't figure out that the shirt we are holding on to needs to be given away because really, that thing is a mess. As long as we keep challenging our minds we will be able to understand ourselves better. We will maybe even one day figure out that illusive piece of frankenstein silverware, or how to make the change we need to, to be happy in our job.
So if you take anything away from this post let it be that life isn't in the problems we face daily but what we get from experiencing them.
Life is in the answers. Life is in the discovery.
--Shlog