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Day 21

 Okay, I'm getting worse and worse at holding myself accountable to this yoga journey. However, the yoga is going well. It looks like I have completed three weeks now! I feel myself getting stronger. Even the difficult sessions aren't so hard. For example, today's session was short (~20 minutes), but it included a rapid flow sequence that I usually find fatiguing and have a hard time finishing. It was tiring, for sure, but I kept up and completed it. I know I wouldn't have been capable of that three weeks ago, and it feels great. 

Off the mat, we've had some tough days and some great days. Starting with the great--our country has a new president. Finally. This past Wednesday was Inauguration Day and it was also Matt's birthday. A double celebration in our house. I didn't plan to watch the entire inauguration, but I ended up enjoying it and was left feeling quite hopeful. Biden didn't pull any punches in his speech when it came to criticizing recent events, and that was good. I loved the music and the poem was beautiful. We have been living such a nightmare for so long that I have a hard time believing that it is all behind us (how could it be?), but this week felt good.

Onto the tough days. It's about school and teenagers. The immediate problem is that W's online curriculum closes on 1/28 for the first semester and then a new semester opens. That means that he is supposed to finish up three more classes within a week. It just isn't going to happen. The work is soulless. There is no interaction with others and no feedback. We knew it would be that way when he signed up, but we didn't at that time know what it would be like to experience it. The kid has major motivation issues and I don't blame him a bit. The problem is that it transforms into anxiety, which turns into anger, and then, you got it, the dark side. He gets awfully nasty and it's hard to live in the house and we are all sad. But! Something good happened today. His guidance counselor, who is also his "teacher" for this online curriculum, said in an email that she's been pleased with his progress since December. That is so nice to hear. We have zero way of understanding where he stands, how he's doing compared to other kids, or how hard we should be pushing. We know from our in-home experiences that we can't push too hard without damaging relationships and ruining days and weekends. But we have no sense of the consequences in school. My friend Robin today reminded me that these days are not normal, nothing close to normal. And we should not be holding ourselves to normal standards. That makes sense and is absolutely true, but we have no idea what standards are reasonable or what the schools will do next year. Honestly, we don't know what they'll do next week. Never in my life have I worked so hard just to get by day to day. So it's not exactly easy to try to guide young teenagers into reasonable routines and healthy habits. Long-term planning is more or less nonexistent. 

Bringing it back to yoga, I try all the time to be in the present and appreciate it for what it is. We can't control what is happening or what will happen. All we can do is try to make as much peace as we can for ourselves and for others. If all the schoolwork doesn't get done, it doesn't get done. Easy to say, right? My heart is thoroughly onboard, but when it comes to the brain, let's just remember that our family leaders are both first-borns with Ph.D.'s. I think you might see the problem and where the work comes in to remind ourselves to take it easy, be compassionate with ourselves and the kids, and let it all be. We are safe. We are healthy. We have food and shelter. And lots of pets. 

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