Category: let go

There’s no way I am going to fail my flight license.

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Yesterday I was very down, I failed for the third time the theoretical exam “Flight Principles”. The morning had started badly with a nasty call at work. Bad mood set right there at 9am. My exam was at 13h15. I didn’t feel it, despite I prepared. The thing is that I prepared based on the QPPL app questions. But the Office Fédéral de l’Aviation Civile puts other questions out. For the third time I made one mistake too much. You are supposed to pass 75%, which is 9 questions out of 12. I made 4 mistakes. Till the last moment I had the fourth question right. It was the section of a body that makes the resistance in an air flow, not the surface. I had clicked on “section” and then the doubt came. I switched to “surface”. For one wrong click I have the stress of having to pass my last chance, if I fail the fourth time, I have to redo the whole theory (13 exams). No chance I’ll do that.

The negative thoughts are so good at piling up. One negative thought is enough to fuel all others. In my head right now, I have this: a pile of negative thoughts, a scenario of a black future: no more ideal job, no more flight lessons, winter coming, no more sex friend…. Pile on pile on pile.

The good thoughts are being stacked elsewhere, where it doesn’t matter. I received the Swiss citizenship, I am flying to Japan and Korean this week, I will give two speeches at a Japanese conference, I am having a good time at water-polo, I have a new co-locataire for the house who is very nice, the weather in Geneva has been spectacular, sunny and warm to this day, my parents are alive, my nephew just turned 30 and my brother 56. I started interviewing candidate therapists to coach me in winter. Life is good.

And yet it could all go wrong. Hell no. I won’t allow it, for God’s sake.

Yesterday and today, I was feeling like shit, self-commiserating, poor me I can’t get an exam right, damn me, I can’t get an exam right, and work sucks, everyone is so inefficient, people unhappy about my pushing too much, yara yara yara. What the f**k. I stop it right there. I want to take this opportunity to stop and reflect on the reaction in my guts, on the irritating and revolting feeling I feel in the stomach, and how to revert this sense of pins and needles in my head, that come from being disappointed, angry, sad, frustrated all at once.

Meditation is still not my thing, too calm for my mind. But I can listen to some ted talks and put my mind at peace for a while. I found a podcast about therapy. I hope I find a good therapist who can accompany me during winter time. Winter is coming and I feel I am not prepared this time. Red flag, red alert.

Let go of super small and super big things

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Letting go. the keyword of these days. the fil rouge, the common thread. Il filo di Arianna. I have been thinking a lot about this diary, and every time I want to write something I get swamped with work or other chores. Now I am writing, even though it isn’t a perfect page. It’s not all I want to say, but it’s something, and it’s an important topic. Be it only a paragraph, I will post it today. Costi quel che costi!

And this is the whole point of the post: let go of my own OCD, whether OCD stands for obsessive compulsive disorder (strive for perfectionism and efficiency for me), or simply daily obsessions or habits that force my mind to not be free or serene. I am letting go of small and big things. I mean, super small and super big.

The super small is leaving the kitchen table not completely tidy as I head to the bathroom after breakfast. I’ll do it in a second step. Super small is not rinsing the tupperware that is on my bathtub and that I just used for something (I won’t go into details); super small is leaving the dining room table full of little telescope items from my dad’s Celestron (one that I am helping assembling, cause dad can’t figure out the instructions); super small (actually not that super small in my head) is forcing myself to not go from point A to point B in an efficient way (efficient being picking up all items along the way that I could do in one go, instead of walking from A to B for 5 times to do what I could in one go). Efficiency and strive for perfection is what drives my mind. I guess it’s OCD all right.

Bigger things, the biggest actually: letting go of Will. This is the W. I mentioned in my posts all this time. His name is Will. He is the love of my life, I left him 5 years ago. It took me 5 whole looooong painful years, mentally and physically, to let go. And just like that, after reading a text from my friend L. in Montreal, it became clear in my heart. I must let him go, he is gone, he has taken a new path, he is “rid” of me, and I accept it now.

I am still on Fluoxetin, 20mg a day since December 2020 non stop. I am in a good mood, I can see above my problems, I can be rational. The big challenge will come when I stop the medicament. Then letting go will have all its power.

One step at a time. For now I am happy about this super big and super small achievements.