goodbye, January

I’ve been trying my best to fight it, but I still managed to sink into a pretty good January funk over the past month. Work frustrations + post-holiday boredom + crappy weather + lack of fun plans in my life have all conspired to sap me of energy and general motivation. I was a little bit encouraged when I watched a recent episode of 30 Rock and saw that it was themed on the January grumpiness phenomenon ~ so it’s not just me at least!

 

{seriously... what is there to do when it's so freaking cold outside??}

For more serious attempts at lifting my spirits, it's been good to get back into the women's faith sharing group at church. Last week one of the verses that came up was Romans 5:1-5 ~ especially the part about rejoicing in our sufferings, since suffering produces endurance which produces character which produces hope. This line tends to make the most sense after getting through hard times, when it's easy enough to look back and think, oh yeah that made me stronger, after all! But in the middle of suffering, it's really really hard to find much to rejoice over.

But. I think that it must have sunk in a bit more recently because last week, in the midst of my bad mood, full of typical grumpy bad mood thoughts, there was a new thought – that it was kind of good to be here in this place of discomfort. This surprised me, in my grumpiness - why would I be happy to be grumpy? Isn't that a  complete contradiction? Upon further reflection, I realized that it had to do with possibility… possibility of growth. The thought in my mind was, I wonder where I’ll end up after fighting through this, since getting through down periods in my life have ultimately made me stronger, overall. So, I mucked through the bad mood for the evening, alone. And you know what? It wasn’t so bad. Especially the part when I put on my Pandora dance party music station and danced around the condo.

So, Romans + solo dance party = solution to January funk? I can dig it.

I am glad that January is over, and hope that my general mood will improve in February. But, being that this is Chicago and we are still smack in the middle of winter, I know I can expect more crappy weather that could keep my spirits down. So, I started brainstorming some ideas for pick-me-ups to see me through to spring. Some ideas:

• bake something to bring to the 8:30 am Monday lab meetings. Mondays always suck since Steve leaves for the airport early, and then I have to go face a lab meeting at work. I'm sure it would help lab moral to bring in some goodies as a surprise :)
• try a new class at the gym. My workouts have been unispired lately. But in November I branched out and tried a spinning class. Despite fears in my head of ending up incapable of walking afterwards.. I ended up loving it. Great workout with an instructor who frequently includes Foo Fighters and Rusted Root in her playlists. I've been motivated to get to this class as it's still relatively new for me and I like the feelings of improvement with a new type of workout. There are lots of other classes that I could try out too... so I should try to add another new one to the mix, in hopes of maintaining motivaton for getting to the gym.
• work on some of the 2010 goals that are more fun ~ like planning a party or vacation! Having something to look forward to is always a good thing!
• call up old friends for a chat. I'm bad at this, but nothing cheers me up like hearing the voice of a good friend who I haven't talked to for awhile, and filling an hour or so catching up.

Anyway those are just a few thoughts... that are hopefully a little better for me than crawling into bed and sleeping til spring, or turning to large quantities of chocolate for comfort :) More suggestions for conquering the winter blahs are quite welcome!