(Winter of?) Discontent

I am not content.

I look at this blog and I want to update it. I want to update the website, too. I want to get new photographs and collect more information to put here and post more often and and and and….

And I’m writing my dissertation, with which I am currently also discontent (it’s not good enough, it’s not long enough, there’s not enough information, there’s not enough time, blah blah blah blah)…

I am not content with:
– my health (I am content with not having cancer again, but other recent tests that require lifestyle changes are not making me very content)
– my bank account balance
– my participation in life in general outside my home
– the state of unpacking the boxes inside my home (come on, I’ve been here 2 years now!)
– current events in my country and the world at large (understatement)
and and and and

Discontent is not supposed to be an end state, or a pit from which one can never emerge. To be discontent is supposed to be like being unhealthy or uncomfortable in that it is supposed to stir us to action. It’s supposed to be the early warning signal that Something Is Wrong and needs to be made right. Discontent should be transitory; a mental check-in on the state of one’s world and an opportunity to regroup and rebuild and all the words that begin with re- that make the world inside and outside the self better.

And yet we are bombarded by situations and people and life simply repeating at maximum volume: I am not content. (If my Facebook feed had a theme lately, it’s this one.)

Whether or not it is a winter of discontent as the stanza goes, mine or anyone else’s, lies in the decision that comes after the declaration.

What are we going to do about it?
What am I going to do about it?
What does this discontent mean, and where does it come from?
What happens next?

I’ll let you know, as I work my way out of discontent, with priorities and with being patient with myself and/or kind to myself where patience and kindness are necessary. I don’t expect it to happen suddenly or immediately. I didn’t become not content that way and I won’t return to a state of contentment that way. Nor, really, does anyone; contentment is not an event but a journey and a continuum. For now I am listening to the voice of discontent and allowing it to point me at the problems I can solve. It is all I can do, and it is what I must do.

Gods willing it won’t last an entire winter.