a healthy dose of self pity

Life has a way of backing up on me.  Things can be swimming along very nicely (thank you very much!) and suddenly there's a nasty rip that feels like it's going to suck me under.

I've had a few weeks of rough weather at sea now.  A friend called in last night and in the course of the conversation told me of her own bad few weeks.  I remarked that I felt I couldn't take a single thing more - the stress levels are high enough thanks, and one more little thing might just be my undoing.

Of course the reality is one more little thing won't make much difference at all.  The things that I'm struggling with right now are no different to those of a million others out there - job insecurity, financial uncertainty, growing children and the ensuing parenting issues, an aging body.  I moan too much about ''doing it alone'' when in reality I'm not.  I've got good kids. I'm in a great community, I have a great partner and I co-parent pretty effectively with the father of my children.  What right do I have to complain, really?

Well, here's the rub.  Perception actually is reality.  So on the days when I feel like I'm doing it alone, I actually am doing it alone.  On the days when lifes challenges feel insurmountable they probably are.

The lesson for me - be kind to myself, be kind to others.  Back to my old mantra - offer grace and be be gracious in return.  Remember that life is always going to give me a few lemons.  It really is up to me to get stuck in and make the lemonade.

forming storming norming

There's a commonly known business model, first developed back in the 1960's, which describes the process that a team goes through to become effective -  storming norming performing et al has been evolved to include a few extra rhyming words but essentially talks about the teething problems, ''getting to know you' stage, boundary setting, and (hopefully) fully formed and healthy state a team can get into.

There's been some jokes around my house recently that the same model could be applied to personal relationships.   I'm not quite sure which bit I'm sitting in at the moment - in fact I'd argue that its a fairly fluid model (much like the grief process, it can be two steps forward and one back some times!), but when I found myself using the ''royal we'' a few days ago it did highlight to me that maybe there's less forming and storming going on and maybe a gentle incline (sounds better than decline!) into norming and performing.

I've read loads of stuff about the process of re partnering.  I'm the first to admit that the are a lot of potential challenges, and its as much about the rest of each persons team as it is about themselves - kids, extended family, friends, work, interests - there's a heck of a lot to negotiate and learn about.  For me, so far so good - or should I say, for us, and whilst the forming and storming is a lot of fun, I'm also looking forward to settling into the new way of normal that I have talked about here before.

Interestingly on the link above there's two extra stages - Dorming and Adjourning.  My guess is that this is probably more relevant to a time bound project, but it certainly highlights the need to remain focused on the well being of the ''team'' in order to avoid complacency (surely one of the death knolls for any relationship) and also to remain vigilant to the potential challenges and pitfalls that can trip up even the most committed of partners.

If you're in a new relationship, or even one that's not so new, where do you think you might fit on this continuum?