Progress
I meant to post this weekend, but I got a little distracted putting together furniture. Since Ouiser is coming to stay with me soon, I am finally making some incremental progress on switching out the guest room and my office. My old office is still full of random piles of stuff, but I’ve mostly cleared out the guest room. To help motivate me I bought a new book case and desk for the new office space. They arrived remarkably fast this week, so I took it as a sign to get moving on this transformation.
As I worked to assemble these pieces into a book case. I realized how much I enjoy putting together furniture. Sounds crazy, I know, but hear me out. It’s a bit meditative for me. My part of my brain is occupied with following the instructions and assembling the pieces, but there is a portion of it that can also wander. It’s a little like when I listen to books as I do jigsaw puzzles. Only at the end of it, I have a piece of furniture I can point to and say, “Look what I did all by myself!”
Any one who has been around these pages any length of time, knows I have a complicated relationship with my independence and sense of accomplishment. I relish my independence, and can be pretty stubborn about doing things on my own. Because my experiences often reinforced the lesson that I needed to rely on myself. Yes, it can be an invaluable strength to have this kind of stubborn independence. It can also be a real challenge. Learning to ask for help is the lesson the universe keeps putting in front of me.
I could have asked for help with these pieces of furniture. Any number of friends would have come over and helped me moved the boxes up to the third floor of my townhouse. Instead, I unboxed them on the first floor and made multiple trips up and down the stairs before assembling them here in my new office. It all worked out in the end. Neither of these pieces required two people for assembly, and I get to feel a great sense of accomplishment in my office space! It may still be a bit of a struggle to get myself to sit down and write, but maybe that sense of accomplishment will transfer and push me to do a bit more writing.
Also, I’ve already asked for help when I eventually move that large dresser into the new guest bedroom. It is not, and never will be, a one person job. Even I know that.
Way to go! Being able to complete a task, such as building furniture, makes one feel powerful! “It’s me against the world”, type feeling.