To change my mind.
To see where I was taking on too much.
To apologize and make an amends to a friend.
To get honest with my person and with myself.
To see where my priorities lie.
To let go.
To surrender.
Such relief.
I have been grappling with something for a few weeks now and I suspect that recent events in my life, like letting go of the idea that I have to go to Burning Man every year for the rest of my life and that I always have to be working toward something, coalesced this afternoon as I rode my scooter into my internship.
I don’t want to do the Aids Life Cycle Ride.
Let me clarify.
If I wasn’t working 40 hours a week, interning 15 hours, and going to graduate school full-time I would be totally down with doing the ride.
But.
I realized.
I am working so hard already and to commit to another commitment seems fool hardy, prideful, and unrealistic.
I like to believe that I am superhuman.
“You don’t have to be Super Carmen,” my person told me, “Carmen is good enough.”
Fuck me.
I forget that all the time.
As if I am not constantly trying to self-improve, do better, live harder, go bigger, I am not enough.
And.
Good fucking grief.
I am enough.
I also realized that I had self-sabotaged myself by committing to do something that would make me re-arrange my already super full schedule and in effect make it so I would not have any days off.
NONE.
Yes, that’s right, I would be working full-time, seven days a week, for the next 10 months.
Fuck that.
I deserve to let myself have a little down time.
To love and be loved.
To not go crazy in my last year of my Masters program.
I mean.
I’m still working six days a week, I’m not slacking.
I rode my scooter to my internship and thought, it’s ok to change my mind, it’s ok to see where I bit off too much and it’s alright to acknowledge that maybe I knew this all along.
That maybe I didn’t buy the road bike when I had the chance because I really knew I didn’t want to do the ride.
I think I was setting myself up to give myself an out.
I had run into my friend who convinced me to ride again a week before I went to Burning Man and his talks about doing training rides made me feel nauseous.
How the hell was I going to fit it in?
I started to consciously let myself know that maybe, just maybe, it would be ok if I changed my mind.
I actually think going to Burning Man really helped me with that.
I realized there, at the event, on a very deep level, that I work really hard to work really hard on my vacations.
Maybe.
Just maybe.
Instead of busting my ass, granted for an amazing cause, and I don’t regret the $95 I dropped to register, it’s a gift that I wouldn’t ask back if I could have it back, to bust my ass on my vacation.
Maybe.
I might want to actually have a vacation.
Like.
Lay on a beach.
Or.
Sit in a fucking cafe and read a book, people watch, drink coffee at ridiculous hours and not worry about getting up at the crack of dawn to ride 100+ miles and then come back from a seven-day ride, for which I would be using my vacation time, to go right back to work.
I mean.
Maybe I want a real vacation.
And.
Then.
When I said it out loud, when I got on the phone with my person, I got to my internship a little early simply so I could have time to talk with my person, I felt the biggest most amazing relief.
I knew in that instant that it was the right decision for me.
“Honestly, doll, I’m relieved to hear you say this, I was wondering when you were going to come to this realization.”
OH my god.
I love that he doesn’t judge me, that he didn’t tell me to not do it, that he let me have my process, and then to have it reflected back to me with honesty, well, that was that.
I’m not doing the Aids ride.
And I am ok with it.
We talked a lot about things happening in my life and I shared about a great deal of joyful things and it was so good to catch up.
I also talked about doing a trip for my graduation.
What that might look like.
Barcelona.
Paris, maybe L’Ile de Re, where my friend has a family home, off the West Coast of France, especially since she was such an important part of my first two years in the program.
That it might be really nice to see her and celebrate the accomplishment.
She was also the person who has said time and again how much I would like Barcelona.
In fact.
My savings account, I have two, one is my prudent reserve, and the second, my travel savings, is called Barcelona.
Not “going to Burning Man” again next year.
Not “doing the Aids LifeCycle ride and spending over three thousand dollars on a bicycle, gear, and who knows how many countless hours on the training.”
NOPE.
It’s named, “Barcelona,” because when my friend mentioned how I should go I thought, that would make a great graduation trip.
So maybe instead of sabotaging my dream with stuffing in more than I can handle, it’s ok to admit I made a mistake.
I told my friend tonight face to face and sat down and talked to him.
He totally got it, and then he added, “I totally honey potted you into agreeing, you know I did, don’t feel bad that you can’t, it’s ok.”
It’s ok.
Sigh.
Fuck.
Thank you.
I apologized again and hugged him and that was that.
I need to apologize to the three people who donated and then I think I’m clear.
I’ll also contact my ride representative and rescind the ride number, the ride will fill up and someone else will get to ride in my stead.
And.
I also contacted my assistant director, who is in charge of scheduling my clients and said, I need to not take clients on Saturdays. I can do a consult now and then, but no clients.
At least for this semester.
I feel a lot better.
Much clearer.
Much cleaner.
And so relieved to be just regular old Carmen.
Super Carmen gets to put her cape back in the closet for at least today.
Thank God.
It needs a dry cleaning anyhow.
Ha.
Auntiebubba 
