FOUND IT.

GRRR. This was supposed to be my ease-into-the-daylight-hours. I have just spent 45 minutes just learning how to add a new post. Apparently I had signed out of my blog yesterday and needed to sign back in before I found the NEW POST icon. Sheesch... this for a non-luddite.

It just demonstrates how my mood-states do not cycle sloothly in one direction or the other. Today, I would say I have gone from Blah to GREY ZONE. Problem with grey zone (zero) is that nothing is resonating. I am, however, feeling run-of-the-mill standard anxiety. My hands are shaking, I want to gnaw on mmy finger nails and eat nothing but Belgium Chocolate. (See I never lose my Standards Mr W!). I really would like to know if this is my body de-toxing from the valium and temazepams but I know the answer will be a resounding 'no' as they do not have that length half-life (or not since the 70s, when I was addicted thanks to very caring but unknowing GPs at Flinders University).

I am going to try to work today as it is soooo grey outside I cannot draw on the necessary sunshine or colours.

I have altered some of my wall in front of my computer in the study. My inspirational pics and postcards are up there now. So it is time to immerse myself in these wonderful places/times.

I didn't have the energy over Eostre (Easter) to paint the walls a more creative colour, so I am living with 'sand' or whatever the bloody neutral is. I also haven't had the cash to buy the set of square dividers/shelves to place along the wall behind me to remove from my direct line of sight all my work and study ring binders and folders. This is a next baby step.

Then the big one. Hiring a skip and decluttering all my teaching material from the boxes under the desk. For those who haven't been here, think of a pine desktop a metre in depth running 2.5 metres along one wall with shelf above. Think of a whole garage wall - as that is what my study was. The narow end of garage is already a wall of inbuilt bookshelves straining to hold all books. (That also needs a makeover. Less anal retentive cataloguing and more colourful archive boxes and some pruning of older texts.)

I have to let go of the past. This is fear of what lies ahead and what is holding my recovery back. I must declutter and look at one day at a time. I refuse to acknowledge that my ONLY future is teaching secondary English, IT or media studies again. I must let go.

I am also not looking at the need to teach University level Cinema Studies, Media Studies or Teacher training. I can aim for a different challenge rather than return to comfort zones. This is not a dig at my colleagues who are doing this teaching, it is just a recognition that for me it would be a retrograde step. I have been there!

To move forward from my current state of paralysis I must take baby steps forward into the unknown. I am frightened. This is perhaps why I have hit the GREY ZONE...

I slept hours (fourteen) last night and it was an effort to even rise out of bed again today. But this blog calls me to the keyboard and makes me face my demons. I will not give in to a complete shutdown day today! I can power through, and up away from this down cycle.