Gracefully accepting this mortal coil
October 4, 2022 11:05 PM Subscribe
So at some point I was yanked out of the void and ended up with a body. The body is fine but I have always been really pissy about the maintenance — at a minimum it needs food, shelter from the elements, regular sleep, and a bit of exercise. I resent all of it. Have you felt this way and found your way to a better place? How did that work?
(Answers from people who have actually made this transition would be appreciated.)
(Answers from people who have actually made this transition would be appreciated.)
I have not at ALL made this transition but I feel like a lot of people who've taken up weightlifting seem weirdly like they have? I keep meaning to get into it for that reason but doing it requires a level of commitment to self care that I have literally never mustered once in my entire life, so
Yeah, on the struggle bus with you, looking forward to the replies here. Very much resent being made of meat.
posted by potrzebie at 12:03 AM on October 5, 2022 [4 favorites]
Yeah, on the struggle bus with you, looking forward to the replies here. Very much resent being made of meat.
posted by potrzebie at 12:03 AM on October 5, 2022 [4 favorites]
Yes, life can be tedious.
Exercise: I do a little bit of yoga each day using Yoga with Adriene videos on YouTube and it has been amazing for me. You don't have to commit to anything really intense or long. It can be hard to motivate myself to exercise but I never regret having done it.
Food: 1. You could become a foodie and really try to indulge with food or 2. You could use something like Soylent to just meet your needs. (3. A balance of the first two.)
posted by kinddieserzeit at 12:24 AM on October 5, 2022
Exercise: I do a little bit of yoga each day using Yoga with Adriene videos on YouTube and it has been amazing for me. You don't have to commit to anything really intense or long. It can be hard to motivate myself to exercise but I never regret having done it.
Food: 1. You could become a foodie and really try to indulge with food or 2. You could use something like Soylent to just meet your needs. (3. A balance of the first two.)
posted by kinddieserzeit at 12:24 AM on October 5, 2022
Ugh I feel this!
I have recently begun to feel more embodied and connected with my body (as in, I feel more like a whole person, rather than just someone who has a body.) Perhaps because pregnancy, but also I think a regular practice of silence to ground me. I actually appreciate my body a bit more.
Practical things: meal planning with my partner (precipitated by doing a weekly curb side pickup shop rather than multiple trips to the supermarket (covid risk) has helped me get into a routine of food.
posted by freethefeet at 12:40 AM on October 5, 2022 [1 favorite]
I have recently begun to feel more embodied and connected with my body (as in, I feel more like a whole person, rather than just someone who has a body.) Perhaps because pregnancy, but also I think a regular practice of silence to ground me. I actually appreciate my body a bit more.
Practical things: meal planning with my partner (precipitated by doing a weekly curb side pickup shop rather than multiple trips to the supermarket (covid risk) has helped me get into a routine of food.
posted by freethefeet at 12:40 AM on October 5, 2022 [1 favorite]
Food - I've made some progress by being honest with myself. While I would like to think of myself as the kind of person who prepares fresh tasty meals it turns out that rarely happens. Apparently, I really struggle with taking time to prepare fruit and veg to a point where it serves as ingredient or is ready to eat as is. So I have to buy prepped, ideally frozen, fruit and veg and use that as required. Apparently, I also just won't cook when I am busy at work. So I buy prepped salads and prepped chicken and what have you and assemble things. Or a tin of beans, or whatever it may be. It's by no means perfect or cheap but it seems to go a long way to help me eat things that are, if not actually beneficial, at least not actively bad for me.
posted by koahiatamadl at 12:42 AM on October 5, 2022 [3 favorites]
posted by koahiatamadl at 12:42 AM on October 5, 2022 [3 favorites]
I've come to despise the word "exercise" for its soullessness. Somehow it's come to connote something like the obligation to spend X minutes a day on a mouse's running wheel. Barf.
Using your body is supposed to be fun. It's time carved out for you. It's worth re-framing the time you spend being active as something you enjoy in itself, playful, exploring your body and what it can do and what it could grow to do. Time away from obligations. "Oh thank goodness I get to go to the gym today. Finally!"
If workouts feel like self-flagellation at a place you hate then maybe it's worth trying something new? Thankfully there are so many communities of physical culture that one of them is bound to be a match. I'd be willing to make an effortpost about that, iff there's interest.
posted by daveliepmann at 1:04 AM on October 5, 2022 [10 favorites]
Using your body is supposed to be fun. It's time carved out for you. It's worth re-framing the time you spend being active as something you enjoy in itself, playful, exploring your body and what it can do and what it could grow to do. Time away from obligations. "Oh thank goodness I get to go to the gym today. Finally!"
If workouts feel like self-flagellation at a place you hate then maybe it's worth trying something new? Thankfully there are so many communities of physical culture that one of them is bound to be a match. I'd be willing to make an effortpost about that, iff there's interest.
posted by daveliepmann at 1:04 AM on October 5, 2022 [10 favorites]
Reading Camus' The Myth of Sisyphus resonated with me in a way that I can still feel the reverberations, 20-some-odd years later. I was a deeply, fearfully closeted gay kid in the pre-internet rural south who had a chronic autoimmune condition and a deep motivation to liberate animals from human tyranny while growing up on a farm. Camus' thesis—which I'd paraphrase as life is a slog, like Sisyphus pushing that boulder, but what happens if you imagine Sisyphus happy with this task—well, it responated. It resonates. It's been a companion along my life's trajectory that I appreciate deeply.
Not quite the same framing as your question, but time passing has allowed me to see where I've gotten relative to that nervous, anxious kid's fears—I've lived all over the world, I've been happily vegan since 1993, I've had fulfilling and shocking and mind-altering relationships, I've been out and comfortable for more than half my life—I can smile at how happy I feel with the arc of that sisyphean struggle. That might be valuable for you, too, that long view into your past that leads up to your present.
posted by late afternoon dreaming hotel at 1:10 AM on October 5, 2022 [28 favorites]
Not quite the same framing as your question, but time passing has allowed me to see where I've gotten relative to that nervous, anxious kid's fears—I've lived all over the world, I've been happily vegan since 1993, I've had fulfilling and shocking and mind-altering relationships, I've been out and comfortable for more than half my life—I can smile at how happy I feel with the arc of that sisyphean struggle. That might be valuable for you, too, that long view into your past that leads up to your present.
posted by late afternoon dreaming hotel at 1:10 AM on October 5, 2022 [28 favorites]
I have always felt exactly how you feel. I have made the transition...I "resent" it less, I would say I've made my peace with it, if that makes sense? I eat much healthier (the key for me here was eating less and better, especially eating less), and do regular exercise (right now mainly stretches related to some issues, and an hour walk every day, though that's just because I have the time to do it).
For me personal, the framing of these sorts of things is really important. I framed it as such: it sucks, but my days do not have 24 hours. They have 15 hours, plus an hour that must be dedicated to bodily maintenance via exercises, and 8 hours that must be dedicated to sleep. I convinced myself that this is simply the cost of existence, of being human. It sucks, but that sort of acceptance/resignation worked for me.
Beyond that, I tried to find ways to couple exercise to things I enjoy. So my walks are long, but I listen to audiobooks...which makes them fun. I also have a really good walking knowledge of my slice of the city where I live! This cuts both ways, though, because sometimes I feel like I should prioritize more vigorous exercise, but I don't think I'd be able to listen to audiobooks. But what works for different people varies.
But the key really has been just accepting that this has to be a top priority. For me, writing out priorities in tranches works. Priority 1: my relationship with my wife. Priority 2: body maintenance. Priority 3: my longtime friends. Priority 4: work/study. Priority 5: acquaintances. Priority 6: other hobbies. And then there is sort of a flow downwards...like, my wife will always trump anything else. Then body maintenance trumps everything else, even work/study (that was the hard one for me). And so on.
I don't know that this would help anyone else, as it's fairly idiosyncratic to me, but it's what has helped me....and I mean, I feel/felt exactly the way you described, and have transitioned to healthier habits. And framing/planning/etc has been a big part of it.
For eating, what I accepted is that food is not fun. Probably a bit extreme, but different framing works for everyone. For me, the key was that food was serving two purposes...one was nutrition/sustenance, and the other was a form of enjoyment. But the enjoyment side of thing can get unhealthy very easily. So I basically separated the two. I have a sort of "enjoyment budget" of what is acceptable...of course, once you get into the habit of eating more healthily, it becomes easier to balance, but basically I accepted that food was no longer a source of joy for me. For me, it was easier to just...write off food altogether, than to have to stress out a bunch about it. I then have go to meals that are easy, nutritious, and tasty enough. I mean, it's definitely possible to do this and still eat well! But I dunno, for me, changing my relationship to food and its place in my life helped a lot. But that's sort of how I am...I deal better with more extreme but clearer "rules" that I set for myself, rather than vague things like "eat better" that might involves a bunch of hard to balance variables. Once I was eating better (less meat, more greens, and just less in general), I sort of worked fun stuff here or there. Again, a rule based approach works well for me. One piece of dessert a week. Eating more than I normally do once a week. One bubble tea a week. That sort of thing. People have accused me of being a robot before...
For me personally, the key has been creating structure where I don't have to think about it...and where it can be tolerably pleasant. So I sort of sit down, think up what makes sense, then come up with very low friction ways to realize it. This is why walking is nice! I can walk anywhere, any time. For anything else, the friction makes it easy to say "well today was a long day..." or whatever and talk myself out of it. But not a walk! Grab my headphones, throw on an audiobook, and go. And I really enjoy edxploring random places.
That said, I would like to work some more vigorous exercise into my day...
posted by wooh at 1:43 AM on October 5, 2022 [7 favorites]
For me personal, the framing of these sorts of things is really important. I framed it as such: it sucks, but my days do not have 24 hours. They have 15 hours, plus an hour that must be dedicated to bodily maintenance via exercises, and 8 hours that must be dedicated to sleep. I convinced myself that this is simply the cost of existence, of being human. It sucks, but that sort of acceptance/resignation worked for me.
Beyond that, I tried to find ways to couple exercise to things I enjoy. So my walks are long, but I listen to audiobooks...which makes them fun. I also have a really good walking knowledge of my slice of the city where I live! This cuts both ways, though, because sometimes I feel like I should prioritize more vigorous exercise, but I don't think I'd be able to listen to audiobooks. But what works for different people varies.
But the key really has been just accepting that this has to be a top priority. For me, writing out priorities in tranches works. Priority 1: my relationship with my wife. Priority 2: body maintenance. Priority 3: my longtime friends. Priority 4: work/study. Priority 5: acquaintances. Priority 6: other hobbies. And then there is sort of a flow downwards...like, my wife will always trump anything else. Then body maintenance trumps everything else, even work/study (that was the hard one for me). And so on.
I don't know that this would help anyone else, as it's fairly idiosyncratic to me, but it's what has helped me....and I mean, I feel/felt exactly the way you described, and have transitioned to healthier habits. And framing/planning/etc has been a big part of it.
For eating, what I accepted is that food is not fun. Probably a bit extreme, but different framing works for everyone. For me, the key was that food was serving two purposes...one was nutrition/sustenance, and the other was a form of enjoyment. But the enjoyment side of thing can get unhealthy very easily. So I basically separated the two. I have a sort of "enjoyment budget" of what is acceptable...of course, once you get into the habit of eating more healthily, it becomes easier to balance, but basically I accepted that food was no longer a source of joy for me. For me, it was easier to just...write off food altogether, than to have to stress out a bunch about it. I then have go to meals that are easy, nutritious, and tasty enough. I mean, it's definitely possible to do this and still eat well! But I dunno, for me, changing my relationship to food and its place in my life helped a lot. But that's sort of how I am...I deal better with more extreme but clearer "rules" that I set for myself, rather than vague things like "eat better" that might involves a bunch of hard to balance variables. Once I was eating better (less meat, more greens, and just less in general), I sort of worked fun stuff here or there. Again, a rule based approach works well for me. One piece of dessert a week. Eating more than I normally do once a week. One bubble tea a week. That sort of thing. People have accused me of being a robot before...
For me personally, the key has been creating structure where I don't have to think about it...and where it can be tolerably pleasant. So I sort of sit down, think up what makes sense, then come up with very low friction ways to realize it. This is why walking is nice! I can walk anywhere, any time. For anything else, the friction makes it easy to say "well today was a long day..." or whatever and talk myself out of it. But not a walk! Grab my headphones, throw on an audiobook, and go. And I really enjoy edxploring random places.
That said, I would like to work some more vigorous exercise into my day...
posted by wooh at 1:43 AM on October 5, 2022 [7 favorites]
I'm a doctor
The fact that you could take better care of yourself doesn't mean you're obligated to.
Internalizing social pressure to maximize/improve (physical) health is fine, but beating yourself for not acting accordingly, for not pulling off the "transition," isn't
That said, the fact that you're thinking about this stuff is great. Here's some more stuff to think about:
Exercise:
If you're running (or lifting weights, or doing plates, or whatever) because you "have to" get in shape, you won't stick with it. If you're running because you enjoy it, you will stick with it
Studies show that willpower is finite. People just can't sustain activities they hate.
Studies also show that enjoyment is key to making physical activity a part of your life. What activities did you enjoy as a kid?
posted by BadgerDoctor at 2:55 AM on October 5, 2022 [7 favorites]
The fact that you could take better care of yourself doesn't mean you're obligated to.
Internalizing social pressure to maximize/improve (physical) health is fine, but beating yourself for not acting accordingly, for not pulling off the "transition," isn't
That said, the fact that you're thinking about this stuff is great. Here's some more stuff to think about:
Exercise:
If you're running (or lifting weights, or doing plates, or whatever) because you "have to" get in shape, you won't stick with it. If you're running because you enjoy it, you will stick with it
Studies show that willpower is finite. People just can't sustain activities they hate.
Studies also show that enjoyment is key to making physical activity a part of your life. What activities did you enjoy as a kid?
posted by BadgerDoctor at 2:55 AM on October 5, 2022 [7 favorites]
Best answer: This is me too. And, like some other commenters, I'm autistic, and still perpetually frustrated by the fact that my sleek disembodied intellect still has to haul around this embarrassing farting difficult-to-troubleshoot meat sack in order to exist.
When things were much worse (alcohol abuse & disordered eating), what finally got me over the hump of even basic self care was pretending that my body was a dog I'd reluctantly adopted after its owner died. I didn't want that dog, or the responsibility of taking care of it, but the dog deserved the best care I was capable of giving it, because it still existed through no fault of its own and I was the only person around to help it.
Looking after me is still an idea that mostly leaves me cold, and I was smart enough to know even in that very rough point in my life that trying to better integrate my body with my sense of self was a hiding to nothing, but I'm dog-goofy enough that I was able to give my body regular food, walks and comfort through that framework.
More recently, this kind of meme has also helped a lot. For anyone who doesn't want to click through, it's a social media post that says, "Remember that you are an omnivore, a predator, and a pretty big one at that. You are not a bee or an ant. It is, in fact, normal for you to just want to lay around not producing anything. You're a mammal. Stop judging yourself for not being a hive insect." (I also happened to tell my manager about this tweet when I first moved into her team last year, and a few months ago she admitted she's been going around telling everyong that they're large mammals, which I got a huge kick out of.)
For some reason that mindset really helps me resist hustle pressure on days when I just want to curl up and rest. It's sort of the opposite of the "must constantly work to optimise everything" approach that I think is a really easy trap to fall into around self care as well as everything else in life. Sometimes what your body actually needs isn't optimisation, it's the chance to be a soft warm animal that isn't doing very much.
posted by terretu at 3:18 AM on October 5, 2022 [37 favorites]
When things were much worse (alcohol abuse & disordered eating), what finally got me over the hump of even basic self care was pretending that my body was a dog I'd reluctantly adopted after its owner died. I didn't want that dog, or the responsibility of taking care of it, but the dog deserved the best care I was capable of giving it, because it still existed through no fault of its own and I was the only person around to help it.
Looking after me is still an idea that mostly leaves me cold, and I was smart enough to know even in that very rough point in my life that trying to better integrate my body with my sense of self was a hiding to nothing, but I'm dog-goofy enough that I was able to give my body regular food, walks and comfort through that framework.
More recently, this kind of meme has also helped a lot. For anyone who doesn't want to click through, it's a social media post that says, "Remember that you are an omnivore, a predator, and a pretty big one at that. You are not a bee or an ant. It is, in fact, normal for you to just want to lay around not producing anything. You're a mammal. Stop judging yourself for not being a hive insect." (I also happened to tell my manager about this tweet when I first moved into her team last year, and a few months ago she admitted she's been going around telling everyong that they're large mammals, which I got a huge kick out of.)
For some reason that mindset really helps me resist hustle pressure on days when I just want to curl up and rest. It's sort of the opposite of the "must constantly work to optimise everything" approach that I think is a really easy trap to fall into around self care as well as everything else in life. Sometimes what your body actually needs isn't optimisation, it's the chance to be a soft warm animal that isn't doing very much.
posted by terretu at 3:18 AM on October 5, 2022 [37 favorites]
I suppose my take on the whole thing is even more succinct. “I shouldn’t be here” tends to be my theme song. I haven’t really come to terms with the notion, though. It’s a little...scary...to ponder seriously.
posted by Thorzdad at 4:01 AM on October 5, 2022
posted by Thorzdad at 4:01 AM on October 5, 2022
I am in the lifelong process of getting to be okay with my flesh body, or as I prefer, ugly bag of mostly water, but I occasionally see glimmers of success. The key seems to be acceptance that these glimmers are not going to stick around. I go through phases. For half a year or a few I seem to have got movement down, but then I stop managing that. But then I can do feeding myself well and gaining pleasure from it, or sleeping more restfully, or whatever, for another chunk of time. Sometimes I can do a few of these maintenance things competently with months at the same time.
Each time I manage one of them, it’s like I make a little groove. And each time I can get back into that groove it’s a little easier to do it again. It’s really hard for my brain to remember that I was comfortable doing the thing before, so it’s hard to start, but once I’m doing it, it gets better and easier. Until outside factors or my own boredom cuts in and I get knocked out of that groove. But I’m not yet forty. I’m hoping by sixty I’ve got some pretty stable paths carved out.
Like for instance, with maintaining a clean living space. I am a very messy person and I have an awful lack of tidying habits. Also I live with cats and don’t see myself having a pet-free home ever. But I am very slowly figuring out what combination of organizational items, stuff placement, cleaning tools, and schedules I need to remove as many barriers as possible to maintaining a home that’s at least clean enough for health and safety. Some months I am great at this, doing my laundry in small loads so I can carry it, always emptying the sink every evening so it doesn’t build up, washing linens as soon as they get dirty instead of when I need clean ones I have to wash old gross things… But some months (and years, depending on my mental health) I am just a disorganized dusty cat furry mess. The key is, just because I’m a mess now doesn’t mean I will always be, or have always been. I know more and more each time I manage it that I’m capable, that there are methods and choices I can engage with that make it simpler. When I want to buy something that isn’t consumable, now I think “where will this live? If it doesn’t have a home in the house I can’t get it.” And I also think “is this too heavy/large/fragile for me to use? Even if it’s better quality than other versions?” I’m not a hoarder because I’m not emotionally attached to my stuff but I am a… stacker, I guess, and each time I get into a cleaning groove I cull more things, I make my space easier to keep clean, I make smarter choices about the use of my space for times when I’m not in grooves.
The same kind of incremental two steps forward one step back situation happens with any kind of corporeal maintenance. I’m finally regularly going to the dentist. Now I don’t leave their office until I’ve scheduled my next cleaning, six months down the road. I’m going to my GP at the end of the month and I’m going to see if I can schedule my yearly exam for next year’s while I’m there. I’ve switched from duvets to comforters because I’ve learned I’m too dang short to easily change my duvet cover, so I just got three comforters and will be swapping them regularly. I bought storage bags for each one so I know they will stay clean once washed. I’m learning.
Acceptance is a funny thing, I think. You can imagine it’s like this glorious self love kind of situation, or a zen kind of productive calm thing. But in my experience acceptance is more just… take the small victories, move through the failures, keep existing, scrabbling up each new obstacle as I come to them, or realize they are there.
For a long while, I was so unhappy with being corporeal that I thought maybe I was trans? Part of my anxiety absolutely involves physical dissociation. But as I get better at accepting and accomplishing my long term physical maintenance, the less unhappy I am about my body. I am definitely not always a woman, gender-wise, but I have no desire to transition physically. And I know this confidently because I’ve spent a hell of a lot of time thinking deeply on the matter and talking about it with likeminded friends and trans friends. When lockdowns happened and I had the pleasure of it being socially acceptable to cover half my face, I wore a hat and have glasses and wore baggy clothes and felt comfortably genderless in public for the first time ever. And I learned about myself that yeah, genderfluid is probably a good label for me, as it is currently defined. But it’s not that I don’t always want to have a gender. It’s that I don’t want to be embodied. I don’t want to have phlegm in the morning and be sleepless at night writing novel length AskMe responses. I would dearly love to be able to selectively remove my organs and place them in comfy storage containers for a cleaning and maintenance session while I am elsewhere. I wish to be a yawning chasm of color and sensation, or maybe an acorn, or a teapot that looks like a pumpkin. But that’s just not possible, and I am accepting it, most of the time, except when I’m not, but each time it’s easier to accept it again. However! If the trans thing resonates with you, even a tiny bit, I highly encourage you to investigate this. A lot of people in their forties and fifties think it’s too late for them to transition, or even take steps to break out from a rigid gender expression to something that’s more comfortable for them. But it’s never too late! And everyone I know who has done this work has come out the other side so much more able to care for their bodies overall.
posted by Mizu at 4:06 AM on October 5, 2022 [16 favorites]
Each time I manage one of them, it’s like I make a little groove. And each time I can get back into that groove it’s a little easier to do it again. It’s really hard for my brain to remember that I was comfortable doing the thing before, so it’s hard to start, but once I’m doing it, it gets better and easier. Until outside factors or my own boredom cuts in and I get knocked out of that groove. But I’m not yet forty. I’m hoping by sixty I’ve got some pretty stable paths carved out.
Like for instance, with maintaining a clean living space. I am a very messy person and I have an awful lack of tidying habits. Also I live with cats and don’t see myself having a pet-free home ever. But I am very slowly figuring out what combination of organizational items, stuff placement, cleaning tools, and schedules I need to remove as many barriers as possible to maintaining a home that’s at least clean enough for health and safety. Some months I am great at this, doing my laundry in small loads so I can carry it, always emptying the sink every evening so it doesn’t build up, washing linens as soon as they get dirty instead of when I need clean ones I have to wash old gross things… But some months (and years, depending on my mental health) I am just a disorganized dusty cat furry mess. The key is, just because I’m a mess now doesn’t mean I will always be, or have always been. I know more and more each time I manage it that I’m capable, that there are methods and choices I can engage with that make it simpler. When I want to buy something that isn’t consumable, now I think “where will this live? If it doesn’t have a home in the house I can’t get it.” And I also think “is this too heavy/large/fragile for me to use? Even if it’s better quality than other versions?” I’m not a hoarder because I’m not emotionally attached to my stuff but I am a… stacker, I guess, and each time I get into a cleaning groove I cull more things, I make my space easier to keep clean, I make smarter choices about the use of my space for times when I’m not in grooves.
The same kind of incremental two steps forward one step back situation happens with any kind of corporeal maintenance. I’m finally regularly going to the dentist. Now I don’t leave their office until I’ve scheduled my next cleaning, six months down the road. I’m going to my GP at the end of the month and I’m going to see if I can schedule my yearly exam for next year’s while I’m there. I’ve switched from duvets to comforters because I’ve learned I’m too dang short to easily change my duvet cover, so I just got three comforters and will be swapping them regularly. I bought storage bags for each one so I know they will stay clean once washed. I’m learning.
Acceptance is a funny thing, I think. You can imagine it’s like this glorious self love kind of situation, or a zen kind of productive calm thing. But in my experience acceptance is more just… take the small victories, move through the failures, keep existing, scrabbling up each new obstacle as I come to them, or realize they are there.
For a long while, I was so unhappy with being corporeal that I thought maybe I was trans? Part of my anxiety absolutely involves physical dissociation. But as I get better at accepting and accomplishing my long term physical maintenance, the less unhappy I am about my body. I am definitely not always a woman, gender-wise, but I have no desire to transition physically. And I know this confidently because I’ve spent a hell of a lot of time thinking deeply on the matter and talking about it with likeminded friends and trans friends. When lockdowns happened and I had the pleasure of it being socially acceptable to cover half my face, I wore a hat and have glasses and wore baggy clothes and felt comfortably genderless in public for the first time ever. And I learned about myself that yeah, genderfluid is probably a good label for me, as it is currently defined. But it’s not that I don’t always want to have a gender. It’s that I don’t want to be embodied. I don’t want to have phlegm in the morning and be sleepless at night writing novel length AskMe responses. I would dearly love to be able to selectively remove my organs and place them in comfy storage containers for a cleaning and maintenance session while I am elsewhere. I wish to be a yawning chasm of color and sensation, or maybe an acorn, or a teapot that looks like a pumpkin. But that’s just not possible, and I am accepting it, most of the time, except when I’m not, but each time it’s easier to accept it again. However! If the trans thing resonates with you, even a tiny bit, I highly encourage you to investigate this. A lot of people in their forties and fifties think it’s too late for them to transition, or even take steps to break out from a rigid gender expression to something that’s more comfortable for them. But it’s never too late! And everyone I know who has done this work has come out the other side so much more able to care for their bodies overall.
posted by Mizu at 4:06 AM on October 5, 2022 [16 favorites]
I love my brain. I love hanging around in it, following its flights of fancy, being immersed in it. I want it to be working just as it is for as long as possible.
When I turned 35, a friend of mine, partly as a joke that 35 is OLD, partly because I am am always trying to keep my brain happy bought me Scientific American Healthy Aging Brain. She has a background in neuroscience and said that it was a respected summary of research at the time.
From the book, there are 5 keys to having a healthy aging brain: exercise, nutrition, sleep, social connections, and using it. I reoriented my life deliberately around this framing in my mid-30s. I am in my early 40s now and it has become second nature to prioritize and balance these areas, which I struggled to do fully when I was younger, with the interest of having a functioning brain for as long as possible.
posted by chiefthe at 6:54 AM on October 5, 2022 [8 favorites]
When I turned 35, a friend of mine, partly as a joke that 35 is OLD, partly because I am am always trying to keep my brain happy bought me Scientific American Healthy Aging Brain. She has a background in neuroscience and said that it was a respected summary of research at the time.
From the book, there are 5 keys to having a healthy aging brain: exercise, nutrition, sleep, social connections, and using it. I reoriented my life deliberately around this framing in my mid-30s. I am in my early 40s now and it has become second nature to prioritize and balance these areas, which I struggled to do fully when I was younger, with the interest of having a functioning brain for as long as possible.
posted by chiefthe at 6:54 AM on October 5, 2022 [8 favorites]
I used to see my body as transport for my brain plus a place to get raped, and now I work in the fitness industry and write books. My body was also both the source of life and death for my first child.
For me there was no one cool trick to it, it has been a lifelong journey. Well except one that I will give you at the bottom for tl;dr
But I think the touchpoints I can probably give you to help was first...this idea of "wasted maintenance." You know how Buddhist monks meditate and wash rice? I actually believe humans are touchingly good (and sometimes very bad) at caring for things. We live in groups. We raise children that need care for decades. Lately I pass construction sites for all kinds of weird things (a new subway, a LRT, massive butt-ugly condos) and I think wow, we are really nuts as a species. We want to get our bodies places so badly that we build ships, trains, planes, and an entire planet-choking series of roads and cars and gas stations. We want to connect with people so badly that we create wires that cross the oceans and satellites that orbit the earth so we can do it in real time.
All of these things are through our bodies. The books you touch, the words you read that someone typed. And also, all these things take care and attention. It makes sense that we have to first give ourselves - mentally, physically - that care and attention. A shower, watering a plant, showing up for an elder.
Anyways, when I think back - here's my one cool trick. All my lessons in loving my body have come from being out in the world, whether that's with other people or nature or just sitting on a step in front of the library in the bright warm sunshine.
So try getting outdoors every day and not just zoning out (although podcasts etc. are cool) but have a look at squirrels, leaves turning for fall, shoots of grass in the spring. It's kinda awesome and your body is a huge part of that.
posted by warriorqueen at 7:44 AM on October 5, 2022 [9 favorites]
For me there was no one cool trick to it, it has been a lifelong journey. Well except one that I will give you at the bottom for tl;dr
But I think the touchpoints I can probably give you to help was first...this idea of "wasted maintenance." You know how Buddhist monks meditate and wash rice? I actually believe humans are touchingly good (and sometimes very bad) at caring for things. We live in groups. We raise children that need care for decades. Lately I pass construction sites for all kinds of weird things (a new subway, a LRT, massive butt-ugly condos) and I think wow, we are really nuts as a species. We want to get our bodies places so badly that we build ships, trains, planes, and an entire planet-choking series of roads and cars and gas stations. We want to connect with people so badly that we create wires that cross the oceans and satellites that orbit the earth so we can do it in real time.
All of these things are through our bodies. The books you touch, the words you read that someone typed. And also, all these things take care and attention. It makes sense that we have to first give ourselves - mentally, physically - that care and attention. A shower, watering a plant, showing up for an elder.
Anyways, when I think back - here's my one cool trick. All my lessons in loving my body have come from being out in the world, whether that's with other people or nature or just sitting on a step in front of the library in the bright warm sunshine.
So try getting outdoors every day and not just zoning out (although podcasts etc. are cool) but have a look at squirrels, leaves turning for fall, shoots of grass in the spring. It's kinda awesome and your body is a huge part of that.
posted by warriorqueen at 7:44 AM on October 5, 2022 [9 favorites]
I've always felt the human body was way too high maintenance. If, as some claim, there is an intelligent designer behind this, I would like to meet with them for a Design Review to discuss some of the flaws.
posted by falsedmitri at 9:10 AM on October 5, 2022 [1 favorite]
posted by falsedmitri at 9:10 AM on October 5, 2022 [1 favorite]
Once from this life I would not take
My bodily form from any mortal thing
Hah! Like we got a choice the first time!
The meme that currently helps me is the one about "when dust explodes hard enough, some of it wakes up and starts thinking." It isn’t tidy, but it’s amazing.
posted by clew at 11:18 AM on October 5, 2022
My bodily form from any mortal thing
Hah! Like we got a choice the first time!
The meme that currently helps me is the one about "when dust explodes hard enough, some of it wakes up and starts thinking." It isn’t tidy, but it’s amazing.
posted by clew at 11:18 AM on October 5, 2022
Good comments here, I will return to many of them. I've also found middle-age solace in Stoic philosophy (Marcus Aurelius, Seneca, etc.) - especially the practice of only worrying about things I can control and dropping attachments to things I don't, as well as the concept of amor fati, or love of one's fate; seeing the struggles of life as all of a piece with the joys, and living such that you'd be willing to live the same life over and over again.
posted by sapere aude at 2:46 PM on October 5, 2022 [2 favorites]
posted by sapere aude at 2:46 PM on October 5, 2022 [2 favorites]
FWIW I find it helpful to remind myself that my brain is not evolutionary 'equipped' to fully handle the reality of life in 202x. Moreover I need to remind myself that some of the 'truisms' of 'modern society' are harmful at best and insidious at worst. For instance, take the "follow your passion and the money will follow" advice that is spewed everywhere on social media. The reality of the situation is that I won't find all jobs meaningful... and that's okay. What I do have under my control is how I approach the situation. Some jobs may be great and meaningful. However, it's counter productive for me to look for meaning when there is none... it's important (and okay) to accept that sometimes a job just sucks or pays the bills, and it's not a moral failure to find no meaning where there is none. Similarly sometimes food is just food to fuel the body. Not every meal has to be a fully documented instagram feast.
posted by oceano at 10:11 PM on October 5, 2022
posted by oceano at 10:11 PM on October 5, 2022
Response by poster: Thank you everyone for sharing your experiences. My misery is loving the company.
For those have suggested working on accepting the inevitable, I would say the same thing to others in this position. In fact I would go further and say "embrace the suck." Unfortunately this particular issue has been very resistant to that approach for me.
A "best" answer is very subjective for a question like this. I marked terretu’s for the analogy of accepting responsibility for a pet I didn’t ask for. It does not address my basic outrage of having duties thrust upon me, but may help me execute those duties with care and without seething every minute of it. My body (and mind and soul) are innocent here and in no way deserve to be made casualties of my basic conflict.
Thanks again to everyone for sharing.
posted by Tell Me No Lies at 8:01 AM on October 6, 2022 [1 favorite]
For those have suggested working on accepting the inevitable, I would say the same thing to others in this position. In fact I would go further and say "embrace the suck." Unfortunately this particular issue has been very resistant to that approach for me.
A "best" answer is very subjective for a question like this. I marked terretu’s for the analogy of accepting responsibility for a pet I didn’t ask for. It does not address my basic outrage of having duties thrust upon me, but may help me execute those duties with care and without seething every minute of it. My body (and mind and soul) are innocent here and in no way deserve to be made casualties of my basic conflict.
Thanks again to everyone for sharing.
posted by Tell Me No Lies at 8:01 AM on October 6, 2022 [1 favorite]
I would like to recommend the book How to Do Nothing by Jenny Odell. She outlines, among other things, the ways in which our society has minimized the importance and overlooked the beauty of maintenance, glorifying progress and discovery instead, and how to reconnect with that beauty. It helped me to find enjoyment in the tasks that I often struggle with, like cleaning, cooking, caring for this body. Reading it definitely shifted something cognitively for me.
posted by Isingthebodyelectric at 5:59 AM on October 10, 2022 [3 favorites]
posted by Isingthebodyelectric at 5:59 AM on October 10, 2022 [3 favorites]
This thread is closed to new comments.
posted by flink at 11:59 PM on October 4, 2022 [3 favorites]