Doing hard things
Reminders of our capabilities.
Hi friends,
How are you doing? How has the last month been? I am writing this from a cafe, looking out the window at an incredibly sunny day, one of those days that makes you realise spring is on its way. We did it - the harshness of winter is slowly thawing and brighter days lie ahead.
On this theme, I wanted to write about our capacity to do hard things. Something, honestly, I always struggle to realise I have.
I feel like I’ve written so many times about the idea that we can become anxious about anxiety, stressed about stress… and yet it continues to come up again and again. It’s one of those lessons I’ll need to learn on repeat, throughout my life.
There’s an underlying belief somewhere within me that I’m not capable of handling difficult things or feelings. It’s something I’m sure many of you can relate with too - as humans, we are terrible at estimating our own resilience.
I remember learning this on a course I took about happiness and it’s something I try to remind myself of often.
Recently two things came up for me that I found ‘hard’ (for different reasons) and doing them gave me that delicious thrill of capability.
Before I share what they were, I think it’s important to note that we all have different interpretations of ‘hard’.
Something that feels hard for one person will feel like a walk in the park to someone else. We have different capacities for stress and even then, our individual capacity fluctuates depending on what’s going on in our lives, what’s happening on the world stage, even what’s happening within our bodies (hello tiredness, pre-menstrual cycle, hunger…).
Trying not to judge our own capacities is essential here - we’re only human, it’s OK if some things feel harder for us than they do for others.
I’ll never forget a conversation I had with an ex about my driving anxiety. He walked over to a door, opened and shut it and said “That’s how easy driving is.” For him, that was true. But for me, it couldn’t be further from the truth.
The first hard thing I did recently was actually driving-related.
I got my car fixed
Why was this so hard? To start with, I have a lot of anxiety around driving, cars, all of it. When all the warning lights came on and my car flopped itself into limp mode, I froze. I’d never even been in limp mode before - what was happening and why was it happening here at the traffic lights?
As the car behind me started beeping I snapped out of my frozen state, re-started my car and made it back home (thankfully I was close). When I got in, I decided I would not get in the car again until it had been looked at.
In the past, any car issues I’ve had have been very minor and fixed by the mechanic my parents use. The only problem was he doesn’t work in my area and is usually booked up.
I decided this was something I needed to navigate and I was determined to do it alone, rather than ask my dad to handle it (we’re growing, people).
So I did. I found a mobile mechanic, booked a visit, didn’t quite get the right outcome, made mistakes, booked another mechanic and the problem got sorted. Did I call my dad to sanity-check my approach? Yes. Did I still handle it myself? Also yes.
The second mechanic showed me everything and put my mind at rest, and I got in the car the following day and drove. I was shaking like a leaf the first drive or two, but it got easier.
Since then my car has had it’s MOT, has had another lingering problem fixed and is feeling nice to drive again. While waiting for the various mechanics to do their thing, I got the train to work on my office days and it was good for me to realise I could do that when needed.
The settling realisation of ‘most things can be sorted’ felt reassuring. The next car-related hard thing for me to do is buy a new car. For many people this would be an exciting task, but it’s something I’m dreading.
The outcome though, will be so worth it. I’m due an upgrade. I want an automatic. I want a hybrid. I want to feel that little more secure in the car’s reliability.
So, watch this space for that one.
I got a tattoo
This was hard for different reasons. I haven’t gotten a tattoo in years, but when our beloved family cat Sanka died last year, I thought to myself ‘I want a tattoo to remember him’. A design idea jumped out at me from Pinterest and within a couple of days, I had my appointment booked.
When the day came around I was nervous. I couldn’t remember what tattooing felt like, what if I couldn’t take the pain? I got up early, hopped on a train and enjoyed a pre-tattoo coffee and snack in a nearby cafe.
The design the artist came up with was even better than I was hoping for, and nerves quickly gave way to excitement.
In the past I’ve always spent tattoo appointments forcing myself to chat away to the tattoo artist. This time though, I felt more comfortable to say - ‘I’m going to stick my headphones in and zone out’ (mostly because the artist mentioned on her website that this is totally ok).
I settled in, put a podcast on and waited for the sting of the needle. When it came, my mind immediately responded with ‘is that it?’. I ended up sitting for the entire session without needing a break and chuckled to myself as I thought ‘wow, I guess my pain tolerance has gone up’.
Perhaps after dealing with painful periods for so long, this felt easy. Perhaps it was the placement. Either way, I genuinely almost fell asleep at one stage.
After the tattoo was done I met some friends for lunch which continued the high I was feeling. The hardest bit was the train ride home.
As the soreness on my skin radiated, I allowed myself time to think about Sanka and the fact that he’s gone.
The grief of losing a pet is so unique, and it feels especially strange when you don’t live in the same house as the pet. In some ways it makes it easier. I don’t feel the gaping lack of presence, day-to-day. But in other ways, it’s harder to process.
It just feels like I haven’t seen him in a while, you know? Like every time I go to my parents, he’s just sleeping behind the sofa.
On the train, I pulled up my Sanka photo album on my phone, and let myself feel the pain. It was hard and cathartic and necessary.
Now, a few weeks later, my tattoo is pretty much fully healed. Every now and then, Dan will point at it and say ‘Sanks!’, lovingly. Every time I catch a glimpse of it, I feel at peace knowing that, in a small, symbolic way, I have a piece of him with me forever.
Of course, now I have gotten the tattoo bug again and have ideas to surround him with pretty botanicals to make a half-sleeve (sorry mum).
It was my birthday recently and I’m officially in the last year of my thirties. I want it to be a year of growth.
The hard things mentioned here are tiny and, while significant for me, I know there will be far more harder things to come. Hell, there has been far harder things in the past. There are other hard things happening that I won’t be writing about.
The common thread between all the hard things we experience is that we do them. Somehow. We survive. We grow. We move on the best we can.
If you are dealing with hard things on any scale, I am sending love and the reminder that you are more capable than you think.
Until next time,
Kat x