Growth

Had a rough day yesterday. An unsteady day. Broke a few commitments.

On Monday night, just as I’m getting ready for bed, I notice an email saying I’ve been awarded a scholarship for a day-long workshop on learning Claude Code for the technologically inept, or “non-technical” as they call it. It’s 75% off for me. I’ve been wanting to learn Claude Code for months. Partly because of all the hype, but also because I’ve been yearning to build beautiful bespoke websites to showcase my bodies of work. That’s something that matters deeply to me, and I’ve been fed up with templatized website builders for years.

Yet in the back of my mind, I know I shouldn’t pull the trigger on this. I can barely afford the discounted version, and I’ve made a commitment to myself to lay off the courses and books for a bit, while I focus on writing and moving and recovery. Of all my various addictions and compulsions, online courses have got to be near the top of the most wily and pernicious, as they’re always cloaked in the logic of investment, while they mostly function to soothe a deep wound of unworthiness. Maybe if I learn more, fill my head with information from others who’ve figured it out, then I will be okay. Maybe after this course, I will be worthy of love. Just one more course. This one’s the last one, I swear.

I toss and turn through the night, something in me wrestling furiously around this decision. When I awake, I’ve made up my mind. I’m going to do it. I need a new website for my comms studio. I want to transition another website I’ve been paying for for a year to a free server. I’m going to make this worthwhile. I can barely focus on my daily writing for the Writing Challenge. There’s a weird mix of excitement and guilt swirling around in me all at once.

Fast forward seven hours (yes, it was a full seven hours on Zoom), and I’m exhausted, delighted, frustrated, grouchy, guilty, hopeful. I’ve managed to rebuild the website I was using to chronicle my quest to write 100 manifestos. It’s far from perfect. Claude rewrote all of my copy and made me sound like a generic marketing bro. But still, I built a bespoke website in a few hours and deployed it a free hosting service and saved myself $15 a month. Pretty freaking cool. But I’m also painfully aware by the time the workshop concludes that I could have learned and done this for myself, without the container that I’d paid for. I didn’t actually need the handholding, which is often true.

There’s gallery of hecklers in the back of my head through this whole experience, the loudest being my mom and The Girl, both of whom have expressed dismay and frustration and disapproval of the way I hurl myself into one “educational investment” after another. They’re not wrong for being concerned. And at least with The Girl, I know she can see I’m already competent enough to move forward without learning more. She’s told me as such numerous times.

Right after I moved out of my mom’s RV last year, I sent her an email saying I’d removed her from my Amazon Prime account, which we’d long shared. She’d made so many snide comments over the years about the way I buy books, and no wonder my money situation is so bad. Whenever I’d open Amazon, I’d feel her shaming presence looming there in those pixels. A shaming presence that, ironically, feeds the sense of insecurity and worthlessness that leads to compulsive book buying in the first place. What a pickle. A few months after I boot her from my Amazon account, I learn that she’s booted me from her Costco membership. Fair play. A few months later still, while The Girl is visiting for my birthday, the battery in my car dies while we’re at dinner. I call AAA to get a jump, and learn that my mom has removed me from that membership as well, without so much as a word to let me know. Thanks mom.

Anyhow, back to yesterday. I head into my pizza delivery job at 5pm, as I do most nights. I’m still completely frazzled and zapped from the day spent entirely on screens. But the people demand their cheesy grease bombs, and who am I to deny them?

It’s a much busier Tuesday than normal. Lots of deliveries. Too many deliveries to keep up with. I start taking two at a time. On one of them, I forget a salad, just as I did months before. Just like last time, the customer is incredibly kind about it, and is grateful when I say I’ll be back in 20 minutes. Back in a jiffy with that Greek salad, ma’am. Unlike last time, however, I don’t stew in shame when I get back into my car. I’m frustrated and tired, but this mistake doesn’t feel like evidence of my brokenness like it did back in November. It just feels like a mistake, a thing that happens for every human on this planet, and a thing which I can correct and make right. No big deal. That contrast between this forgotten salad and the one before Thanksgiving is stark. I’m starting to internalize that I’m a human who’s allowed to make mistakes. I’m starting to feel in my body, in my heart, that perfection is not a prerequisite for love. There is healing happening here. What a gift these forgotten salads are.

As I’m winding down my shift, one of the cooks leaves one of our giant pizza slices in the oven a bit too long. It’s extra crispy. Too crispy to give to a customer. She asks if I want to take it home. A few weeks ago, I made a commitment to myself that I wouldn’t eat pizza after my shifts anymore. It destroys my gut and messed up my sleep. Not an ideal pre-bedtime food. And for a few weeks, I’ve been dutifully sticking to that commitment, and feeling proud of myself for it. But last night, I’m so depleted that I say “fuck it, gimme that slice” and gobble it down gleefully when I get home. It’s absolutely delicious.

In years past, I would have viewed this as a transgression. As a sign that I’d broken my commitment, and that I’ve flubbed yet another attempt at getting healthy. Just more evidence that I’m inadequate. But last night, there was a flash of compassion as I ate that big greasy delectable slice. I knew that I might be slipping into dangerous territory, a potential backslide into binging for comfort. But I was able to be gentle and kind and understanding towards myself through it. I was able to provide myself the kind of presence that I wanted from my mom when I was hurting last year.

And now here we are. Doing my daily writing, holding true to that commitment, while re-committing to what matters today. Being sober with food and money, and being kind to myself when I slip up. Onwards.