Do now, freak out later.

Oh my god, it's frigging November.

I went to see my counselor yesterday and started explaining where I thought the problems were.  "I'm sorry," she said.  "Did you expect to be able to balance all this?"

I thought about it.

"Yes?"

She told me that if this was normal life, we'd be working on a way to make it possible, but that this is only temporary.  This is a sprint, and I need to do whatever it takes to get it done.  Now, maybe that sounds obvious, but you know how stubborn I can be.  :D

I told her how I was sleeping better, but when I did wake up freaking out over funds, I got up and went to check the account and make a budget plan.  She reminded me that when I get all stressed out I start to organize and plan.  I looked up from the notebook I was madly scribbling in.

"But won't that help?"

She said it only serves to make me feel like I have control, and what it actually does is keep me from working on what actually needs to be done.  Planning out a homework schedule keeps me from homework and planning the budget at 5 am keeps me from sleeping.  She said I need to do the opposite of plan and let it go.  That sounds baffling but she reminded me that it's the unexpected things that redirect my course and you can't plan for those.  So from now on when I wake up in the middle of the night I'm supposed to listen to my mindfulness CD and go back to sleep or get up and do homework, not budget planning.  :D

I'm up early- not too early, but I'm not exactly awake either- because Chris set up music in our room and spastic jazz has been on all night.  Spastic jazz is not sleepy music!  Arrrrgghh!

So why am I not doing homework right now?  I'm headed that way.  Last night I worked on the independent study class and confirmed for myself again that even if I don't finish something, making progress is a very smart idea.  Today I'm going to print my broadside for Book Arts, dammit.

I'm very glad I got to hash this out with my counselor- I love that she knows me well enough to see the things I don't.  I needed a little mindset readjustment.  She also thanked/chided me for getting her into The Hunger Games series.  I haven't even gotten to the second book yet!  I read my September book on the plane on the way back from Virginia; now that it's November I need to read my October book.  The Hunger Games books go fast, so I started the second one last night after working on English homework. Soon I'll be looking for moments to steal to finish that and hopefully burn right through the last one for November's book.  Then I'll wait until school is over and read my December book after Christmas.  Slowly.  With a nice cup of tea.