Pittsburgh

 This writing is from November 2017. 

I went back to Pittsburgh for Thanksgiving weekend for my 10-year high school reunion. I stayed with Sue and John Todhunter, two family friends from before I was born. Sue and John are like my aunt and uncle. Especially after my Mom and Dad moved away from Pittsburgh in 2007, they always graciously hosted me on my trips back home and I got to know them better as an adult. I can’t thank them enough for their hospitality and support, especially when it came to my career. Sue and I shared a special bond because she did the Fulbright in Tatarstan, which is a Turkic ethnic minority in Russia not unlike the Uyghurs. We always had fun things to talk about regarding academic life. I always felt at home there and they took care of me like their own. 

I also went back to my hometown, Swissvale, a borough right outside Pittsburgh. This was 10 years after my parents had moved out. I went to the house where I grew up, and walked around the perimeter. I rang the doorbell but nobody answered. I walked down the street to Memorial Park and down to the old basketball courts where Dad, Ruth and I used to play and throw the tennis ball for our dog Wyatt and where I learned to ride a bike. Here are my reflections from the visit. 

Going back to Swissvale was such a mix of emotions. I felt sadness for the friends I’d lost touch with, nostalgia for my childhood and my family, and hope for my future.

Driving up Braddock Ave on my way there, a memory popped up of sharing a twin stroller with Hali on our way to First Friends. I was in the back, and she was in the front, and Sharon was pushing us down the sidewalk. I remember feeling safe and connected to Hali. 

I remember visiting Ruth at the Taco Bell when she was working. I remember going to Coral Garden for Chinese food with grandpa and going shopping at Giant Eagle. I remember going running in Frick Park. Walking there on the trails I could still feel the pressure and burn in my chest remembering pushing myself beyond my limits during races and practice. 

As I approached the house that I grew up in--7320 Church St (it seems like I’ll never forget that address for as long as I live)--it looked so much smaller than I remember. The stairs and the porch used to be so big in my memory, but they looked small now.

The sign in front of my own house--my old house--read, “No matter where you are from, we’re glad you’re our neighbor” in Spanish and Arabic. (This was November 2017; Trump had just been elected and these signs were a response to his xenophobia.) I was proud and hopeful of that sentiment, hoping that the people inside lived full and inclusive, not fearful and prejudiced, lives.

I walked to the front porch. There on the porch bricks I saw a series of numbers scrawled in white chalk: 271-1507. I remember writing that. It was our home phone number. I had written it there probably over 20 years ago. I was playing secretary and had written down the phone numbers that I knew on the wall as a game. I remember later people saying it was dangerous to write the number there, how a stalker or kidnapper could use it to rob us or kidnap me. It still hasn’t been washed off. 

The address was there unchanged in black numbers on a white tiled background—7320—a number that I felt would be burned into my memory forever. Seeing it again I felt, “This was me. This was my life at one point, this is where I grew up.” The bright red front door was the same as always. How many times had I knocked on that door to get back inside when I didn’t have my key? I had my first kiss in front of this door; our house had been egged on that screen door. I had my high school graduation party on the other side of that door, welcoming people into my house that I had not seen for a long time, like Hali and Sharon, to celebrate my entrance into adulthood that was really only the beginning in a long journey where I would always be a kid. I knocked on the door and rang the doorbell but nobody answered.

I walked to the backyard. I smiled at the thought of climbing the pine tree outback, its two wooden steps still nailed to the trunk. I remembered fondly gardening with my mom, growing tomatoes, strawberries and apricots in that tiny yard. 

 

The apricot tree that we planted is now so much taller and bigger, it’s amazing! And there were the red doors leading down to the basement that we always played on, using the slope as a slide! How many times I had lifted those doors from above and below in going in and out of the basement for reasons—so important at the time—reasons that I don’t remember now. Jumping up and down on the deck, and storming in and out of the back and front doors soaked in rain water from playing Tag and kickball in thunderstorms. And there was the back window I had climbed through so many times because the door was locked and I forgot my house key. 

A cat peeked out from one of the windows and looked down at me. There was life inside. I peeked in the kitchen window—seeing the same stove, dishwasher and refrigerator and floor from my youth, and there were large glass jars filled with pickled vegetables on the shelves. Someone else was now making their story there.

So much was still the same in ways that triggered my memories, I recalled taking out the garbage on Tuesday nights, cleaning the kitchen floor and loading the dishwasher after dinner.

 

Memories flooded back about Grandpa—him taking us to Wendy’s and Subway, building the deck on the back porch, eating cheerios with Orange Juice.

 

I thought of lots of random memories that made me want to cry because my grandpa is gone now and those days are gone. Living in that house was such a big part of my life that I tried to bury and hide from and forget for so long. There are so many people we have lost touch with and yet meant so much to me, it is sad to think that those are parts of myself that I thought I left behind, I thought I had forgotten, but will always be a part of me. Those experiences—while temporary—will always be a part of me and will always serve as a reminder of the person I am and what has made me the person I am. Those experiences are why I am the why I am today.

As I walked down Church St, I also had vivid memories come back of walking Wyatt around the neighborhood with my CD Walkman.

 

At Memorial Park, I remember climbing the dirt trail in the woods back up to the road and now it’s cement stairs! The tennis court where we used to play with Wyatt was now a parking lot. I remember eating free lunches of bologna and too hard sour apples in the summertime under the pavilion. 

 

I saw a rainbow flag in front of one house on the block, that gave me so much comfort and reflection on how much has changed since I’ve left.

Coffee Break with Brai: Moon Shots

By Brai Schwandt

On sheer coincidence, Saar started writing about their "30-day challenges" at the same time I started writing about mine. I love Saar, and the way they live their life is an inspiration to me. However, the way they do their “30-day challenges” would stress me out if I were to do it the same way.  

Even the fact that they call the goals "challenges" would stress me out. I prefer the word "focus." 

They mark off each day in their bullet journal when they are “successful” and write down every challenge that they do. They have a list of things they want to do for their future challenges. They often have 5 challenges going on at one time. Sometimes the challenges occur on different days for different challenges. They have different categories for their challenges.

This is absolutely not how I do it. 

Some time ago, I started trying to focus on some goal from full moon to full moon as a way of connecting me to my body/mind. I wanted to have another way of measuring time outside of the calendar, while focusing on something that gets me to live a little healthier and happier. I call these "moon shots."  

 

I got the name “moon shot” from the phrase "shoot for the moon" because it means trying to achieve something that is difficult to reach.  As I attempt a moon shot, it becomes easier and more habitual. I also have a lot of things that I want to do but are not necessarily difficult. I want to play guitar, sing, do voice lessons, run, do PT, do yoga, meditate, or do intermittent fasting. I have incorporated these into my moon shots as well. 

 

Since starting my moon shots, I've given up sugar, alcohol, caffeine, and weed a few times for different reasons. (Those are my 4 vices of choice.  My brother and I call them "the Big 4.") But if someone were to ask me when was the last time I gave up something?  I would just say, "Many moons ago."  

 

I don't have a history of my moon shot goals written down. I don’t need a good record of such things.  Ultimately, it doesn't really matter. I try to stay in the present and what matters to me is my current moon shot, not the previous ones.  

 

Going from full moon to full moon is a fun way for me to connect with the moon.  When I'm doing a moon shot and I look up into the sky and see a new moon, I know that I am halfway through a moon shot. I get excited as we approach the next full moon. It's beautiful to watch the moon change from day to day. Following the lunar cycles is a tangible yet inexact way to watch the time change.  I like looking up and seeing a waxing crescent of a moon in the sky and not knowing precisely how many days there are until the next full moon. It makes me feel like time isn't so definitive, and that I can go with the flow of how I feel. 

 

I find it to be much more enjoyable and natural than watching the days of a calendar count up toward 30 or 31 (or, for February, 28 or 29 depending on the year).

 

I intend for my moon shot goals to have a type of impermanence and non-exact nature to them. 

 

My goals are made when I look up at the moon and see a waxing crescent moon. I think, "Hmmm… what will I do for the next moon phase?  What do I need right now?"  Sometimes that changes 3 or 4 times before I find the one thing I want to focus on.  I often find that those other 3 or 4 things are on my mind as I go through the full moon phase and my life is healthier and happier. 

  

The last few months have been so chaotic that I disconnected with the moon and my goals. Over the last few months when moving from Denver to Phoenix and starting a new job, there were a few weeks where I didn't touch my guitar even once.  When this happens, it is one of the main ways that I know that I am stressed. My moon shots are a way for me to reconnect with the way I want to live my life and recognize when my life is deviating from what I want.  

 

I choose one thing that will help me reconnect with myself on a full moon and I focus on that until the next full moon. Then I do it again. I rarely ever write anything about it. In fact this may be the first time I've really ever written something about a moon shot goal that I had. 

 

My experiments with different “odd” things may be one of the reasons I am a bit of an eccentric person.  I like to try new things and experiment with my life.  These moon shots give me a chance to try something really “wild” like taking two naps a day or walking barefoot. 

 

I've done many different things to varying success.  It's a very personal experience and sometimes I'm embarrassed when I don't do something perfectly. 

 

Life gets overwhelming sometimes.  The weeks and months and years go by and life is dictated by what day of the week it is, what time it is, and how many months away we are from whatever deadline in X years. I understand that it is necessary in our world, but it is exhausting. 

So I enjoy connecting with the moon in a way that is less structured and less exact.  My goal is to be healthier and create my experience. These moon shot goals are intended to be something that I carry on into my life beyond the single lunar cycle...if I find that they help me be more true to myself. 

30-Day Challenges: Yoga Part 4

Reflections on my 30-day yoga challenge, COVID and how structures allow freedom:

Later, I wrote some notes in my journal reflecting on the April 2020 30-day yoga challenge. This is verbatim what I wrote on May 1, 2020:

"COVID has been a re-birth for me, for slowing down is the hardest thing I’ve ever done. So funny to think about how I’ve done all these hard things in my life--like getting a PhD and learning Chinese and living abroad--and it’s actually the doing of nothing that is the most difficult of all. For in the doing of nothing that is where we cannot find the value in the external, but we can only look inside. When we spend this time doing nothing, we realize there is indeed value in just being, value that was there all along, value in our humanity. I was always looking for home--belonging and love--in the external but it’s been inside me all along. Like tapping a maple tree for syrup, once you can tap into the infinite love inside you, love flows freely to feed and nourish the people around you.

There is value in writing, value in lists, value in planning and agendas. There is value in these 30-day challenges for me—allowing me to try new things and trying new and consistent habits in a routinized and systematic way gives me a lot of joy. AND there is value in presence and allowing and flexibility. It’s not one or the other, it’s both. I needed the vocabulary and some of the grammar before I could start having conversations, just like I needed some yoga moves before I could do it on my own. But from there it was a creative conversation with my body. 

You can use structures to create freedom. You get to create your experience."

Ultimately using structures to create freedom is what these 30-day challenges are all about for me: using the structure of the month and a daily routine to create a sense of freedom around the life that I want to live. My intention is to use the vocabulary of the challenges to ultimately create a conversation with my body and my life that builds a co-created experience. Eventually, I want to build trust in myself to create my experience without rules...but structure will always be a part of my life and I'm okay with that. For me, structure and discipline brings freedom. 

It's an infinite journey and a never-ending conversation. But it's a start. 

Now, over a year later, I know I’ve only just scratched the surface. I am on a lifelong journey of creating conversations--conversations with my body, my spirit and other spirits. I am truly a newbie and still learning everyday more about my body and more about what it means to do yoga in a spiritual, mindful, and challenging yet nurturing way for my body.

How yoga shows up in my life these days:

In the months that followed the 30-day yoga challenge in April 2020, I continued doing Yoga with Adriene videos, but I also had the confidence to start doing yoga on my own. This was especially helpful on camping trips when I didn’t have access to the internet. 

Eventually, I completed three more of her 30-day challenges (she has several different ones, I have done Yoga Camp, Revolution, and Breath over the past year). But the next time, I didn't hold myself to doing it every day. It usually took me three months to finish one 30-day yoga journey since I would only do it every few days or so. 

When I moved to Prague in February 2021, I didn’t have internet at home for four weeks. Perfect way for me to start transitioning into doing my own yoga with the training wheels of the video. Sure enough, by April of 2021, one year after starting yoga, I was doing it almost entirely on my own. Now, in June 2021, I am doing yoga for at least 30 minutes a day but up to 2 hours on some days. Entirely on my own. I almost never watch Yoga with Adriene anymore—she is awesome, but these days I’m getting a deeper and better stretch and overall experience if I listen to my body. Currently I am enjoying my “hot yoga” sessions in my humid, stuffy apartment during my Prague summer as sweat drips down my face and torso like I've just showered.

Conversations with my body:

Of course, yoga has helped me listen to my body and communicate with my body. But it’s not as though my disassociations with my body have suddenly been cured and I now have full access to my intuition. Far from it. More than ever, I realize how hard it is to really listen to my body and how often I don’t do that. 

When I do stop and ask my body what it needs, it usually responds: "Slow down. Be gentle with me. I'm here for you in whatever you want to do. I'm here to be the temple for your spirit and help you serve the universe. I'll take you wherever you want to go and whatever you want to accomplish. But you have to be patient and nice to me."

The other thing it tells me? "I want you to move around and be creative and not sit at the computer." 

I have learned that a relationship with your body is not a given, but it is a practice. It’s a conversation, not a dictatorship. This journey is not like you are driving the bus and the body is along for the ride. Your body wants to drive too. If you don’t listen to its requests to have a chance to drive for long enough, it will take over the steering wheel using tactics like fatigue, pain and illness to let you know that it’s driving now. It will take over because you ignored it for long enough.

There is a feeling of infinity to the road trip with your body; the practice of the relationship with the body; there is no no end point nor an end goal. There will always be layers of the onion to peel off forever. 

I never thought I would become one of those spiritual yuppies doing yoga and whispering Namaste.

Now I want to tattoo “Namaste” and “OM” on my foot.

What will happen in my future that I had previously thought was “impossible” or “just wasn’t for me”?

What do you want to do today to start creating the life that you want to live? 

How can you find freedom in the chaos? How can you find freedom in the structures? 

30-Day Challenges- Yoga Part 3

Adriene emphasizes in her videos: "Trust your body to tell you what it needs." 

This was revolutionary for me. You mean if I feel hungry that means I might actually be hungry? Shocking. You mean if I feel tired that means I might actually be tired and I should slow down or take a nap? Mind. Blown. You mean if my hamstrings feel like they could use a stretch that I should stretch my hamstrings? My whole world was upside down. 

The idea to listen to my body was not completely knew--my therapist had been harping on this for a long time--but I had never really, truly put it into practice on a daily basis like I was doing during the yoga challenge of April 2020. Doing yoga on a daily basis gave me a new way to relate to my body.

Adriene constantly reminds her yogis to focus on "sensation over shape." In other words, pay attention to how the move feels, not what it looks like. Adriene tells the viewer not to just follow her blindly but to listen to their body and “Find What Feels Good" (I capitalize this phrase because the acronym born from this phrase, FWFG, is Adriene's motto and logo for her business.) She often tells the viewer to close their eyes. She encourages practitioners to not just watch the video, but to make adjustments or changes according to what feels good in their body. This started to change the way I communicated with my body.

On the last day of the 30-day challenge, Adriene looked up at the camera and told us she would be taking off the microphone shortly.

“It’s Day 30 and today’s session is called Journey which is what this thing is all about: the journey home...

Don’t panic. Because this is what it’s all about. You have the tools. You've always had everything that you need to uncover, to find what feels good and to reveal what matters most...

You’re going to use the vocabulary that we’ve learned together thus far to create your practice and to create your experience. 

Today embodies the spirit of yoga, which to me is this essence and spirit to take care of myself...Enjoy. Find What Feels Good.”

It blew my mind. I felt like a warrior and a tree, a flower and a cobra, a dancer and frog, a lizard and a dog, a camel and a happy baby. I wanted to cry. I wanted to laugh. I felt so free. What? I had the freedom to do what I wanted?! I felt courageous and strong with this newfound freedom.

Adriene's message echoed in my mind: You had all of the tools all along. It’s just about discovering them and using them.

I had really never felt this sense of happiness and freedom emanating from someplace deep inside myself. It was happiness from the inside out. I was used to external pleasures, of course, being a privileged white person in America with plenty of food, warm showers and soft sheets, but this was a distinctly different experience. 

I had this realization: You don’t need to search outside yourself for a safe, comfortable, or accepting place. All of the love you will ever need is inside yourself, always and forever. 

The video ended with an epic soundtrack that made me want to reach my hands up to the sky in welcome and surrender and cry all at the same time. In fact, every time I hear that soundtrack I cry because it brings me back to that time during COVID, that terrible and awful and beautiful and wonderful time where I got to be by myself and struggle through my relationships and fear and anxiety in ways that I had previously not experienced. 

At the end of the video, Adriene had a scrolling message for the viewer, that read:

To be continued...

30-Day Challenges: Yoga Part 2

Fast forward to March 2020 when COVID hit. Suddenly, I had a ton of time on my hands. Time alone. Time to be with my body, alone and in silence for the first time in my life. 

Finally, a chance for me to finally do all the things I had been meaning to do! Hooray! I had visions of my to-do lists finally cleared and blank. I imagined putting check marks next to ALL OF THE THINGS. I had fantasies of finally being able to say, "well, I've done everything I've needed to do, I can die happy now." Yoga was one of those things I had been putting off because of "lack of time" and now I had no other excuses left.

Upon Maddy’s and Ruth’s suggestion, I tried one of “Yoga with Adriene’s 30-Day Series” as my 30-day challenge for April 2020. I did the one called “Journey to Home.” Adriene used yoga to encourage manifesting and embodying a sense of “home” in the body. Each day had a different theme, such as “Nurture,” “Grow,” and “Balance.”

Adriene has a message that she repeats at least once in almost every single video to remind the viewer to practice good posture: “Head over heart, heart over pelvis.”

From a physical standpoint, this encourages putting the weight of your head and torso over the strong muscles of your hips and thighs. When I did this at first, it felt like I was leaning backwards because I was so used to a more forward slumped poster. Like many people, I have a kind of “computer posture” and “texting neck” that causes heads and shoulders to lean forward.

(Leaning forward results in the small muscles of the neck having to hold the entire weight of your head (11 lbs!), which is really heavy. By aligning head over heart (aka torso), the head can rest effortlessly on the spine, which is what it is meant to do (how else do you think people carry heavy loads on their heads? It's not just from muscles, it's from the spine being stacked on top of one another so the muscles don't have to do any work.)

To this end, I started internalizing another message: “Your mind and your heart rests over and is supported by your body.” The source of everything is in your body, I started realizing.

From a spiritual perspective, Adriene’s message is to align our minds, hearts, and bodies. 

I started to internalize the idea that my mind, heart, and body were integrated aspects of myself that composed my spirit.

Adriene also teaches that the breath connects these three parts. The breath connects it all as the breath is the source of our energy. 

I loved the Yoga with Adriene message, I loved her videos and I loved the routine of watching a video each morning. I was starting to learn yoga, and connect with my body on a spiritual level. I could already feel myself being more aware of my posture, and started to feel my muscles relax with the increased stretching. 

One day in the middle of the 30-day yoga challenge, I did a "Sabbath Day" with Brai where we shut off all electronics for the day (including clocks, cars, stoves, and lights! It really was fun. We used candles in the evening and ate salads. We took naps, went on walks, watched the sunset, and Brai played guitar while I journaled). 

“I want to make one exception for myself and still do the Yoga with Adriene video though,” I explained, saying that I still wanted to use my computer. 

“I bet you could do yoga without the video,” Brai countered. Brai had already been following Yoga with Adriene on YouTube and had been practicing yoga for several years. “Why don’t you try—just for one day—doing what your body tells you to do and not watching a video?” Brai suggested. 

I squirmed in my seat. I wanted someone to tell me what to do. I wasn’t confident in myself. “I don’t really know anything about yoga,” I told myself. “I’m not capable,” I told myself. “I don’t know what I’m doing,” I told myself. 

“Are you sure? I don’t even know what I would start with,” I said.

“You can do it,” Brai encouraged. 

"You really think so?" I asked. "I'm a newbie."

"I really think so," Brai said.

The knot in my stomach told me that I was uncomfortable with this idea. Deep down I knew this knot meant that I should do it anyway. So, on our Sabbath Day, I didn’t turn on my computer to search YouTube for the next Yoga with Adriene video. I just did some of the moves that I had learned the past couple weeks. I also imitated Brai at times, who was doing their own free form yoga across the room. I did what my body told me to do. It felt good. “Wow, I really can do this on my own,” I thought. 

As the month progressed, I continued to do the videos, but I would do extra stretching after the video or in the evenings that was totally free form--just doing what felt right.

To be continued...

30-Day Challenges: Yoga

Yoga occupied a paradox in my mind for a long time. On the one hand, it seemed boring and pointless. Who had the time to just meditate and stretch? I had done some yoga several years ago and it always seemed kind of lame. One the other hand, it seemed like way too much work. As someone who was very stiff and just not flexible, the idea of doing warrior 1 and tree pose sent shudders of terror down my spine. That was for people who were calm and focused, strong and flexible. Not me.

I had all kinds of other excuses: That yoga was for rich yuppies who tattooed Namaste to their foot when they didn’t even know what it meant; That yoga was for spiritual yuppies who disrespectfully appropriated Indian culture; That yoga was for people who pretended to exercise because they were too weak or lazy to really exercise.

In December 2019, my roommate Maddy (the same one from the sugar challenge) had invited Terrence and I to do a “Yoga with Adriene” video with her one night. I remember that day so clearly. We were doing a roommate “family dinner” night and Maddy and I had prepared dinner. Terrence announced that he wasn’t hungry yet and asked if we could eat together later. Maddy suggested we do some yoga while we waited for Terrence to get hungry. I was PISSED. Like a toddler. WTF. I was hungry. Why did I have to wait? I don't like discomfort and felt like a 2-year old. 

I reluctantly acquiesced and we did 20 minutes of yoga. It was really nice and not too hard.

I didn’t think much about it again, but the seed was planted.

As the months continued, my joints were stiff and my muscles ached. I knew in the back of my head that I should stretch more, but it was something I just kept putting off. I had so many other things going on. How does anyone have time for that shit, I thought. I was also hesitant—I “knew” I was “bad” at stretching and didn’t really feel like doing something I perceived myself to be bad at. I didn’t have the mental energy for it.

My therapist had been doing some “somatic” work with me in connecting with what my body wanted and what emotions my body was communicating to me. A friend had also introduced the idea of somatic therapy to me in 2018—the idea that our body had inherent wisdom and that our bodies were a source of spiritual healing. The seeds were planted and starting to grow.

To be continued... 

30-Day Challenges: No Challenges

THE NO CHALLENGE CHALLENGE 

Brai noticed that I was very strict with myself regarding all of these challenges. I hated it if I missed a day and would go out of my way to make sure I had done my challenges each day even if I didn’t really want to. 

I was also going way over the top by doing three to four different challenges each month. Me? Going way over the top? Noooooo. (This should come as no surprise to anyone reading this blog.)

I liked doing one challenge for my body (e.g., 5 minutes of stretching), one challenge for my mind (e.g., 15 minutes of reading), and one challenge for my spirit (e.g., 5 minutes of meditation) each month because that felt like a nice way to balance things out. 

“Have you thought about doing no challenges for one month?” Brai asked me one day. 

“Now that would be a real challenge!” was my response. 

I didn’t really want to let go of my routine--I liked having 3 things to check off my list right away each morning--but I did want to challenge myself. So I did it. In October 2020, I did a no challenge month. No challenges for the month of October, just whatever felt right and whatever I felt like doing each day. 

I didn’t fall off the wagon and eat chocolate cake every night. I still did Crossfit and stretching in the morning. I still did my Intermittent Fasting and mindful eating. I still did my creative writing. The earth didn’t fall off its axis. 

Did I—dare I say—maybe learn to trust myself a little bit??

Maybe, just maybe, I can trust myself to take care of my body without it being a kind of "obligation" from an arbitrary notion of a challenge (30 is an arbitrary number, too). 

I have to say though, the “no challenge” challenge was not my favorite challenge. Now, I love having unstructured days where I don’t have anything planned. One day is one thing. A whole month is a whole other thing. I felt scattered and lost, like I had no direction at times. Most of all, I felt unaccomplished. 

I wanted that list to check off. I wanted to have those things to do each day, the routine to keep me anchored. I wanted the feeling of accomplishment to say, I DID IT!! I crave that pat on the back, the triumphant feeling of being able to brag about what I'd done (hence, this blog). Indeed, there is a little bit of arrogance inherent in the challenges in feeling like I was conquering something—or someone? That someone being myself? I felt like I was conquering laziness itself like a knight defending its castle--the castle being my ego. 

These days in Prague I have a very unstructured schedule. Nobody cares when I work or what I do. This gives me an opportunity to re-think my structured lifestyle. Don't get me wrong, I still do at least three challenges each month and I am not ashamed of that. But I am trying to find a delicate balance between appreciating the structured parts of myself and also trying to let go of the list-making as a crutch. My lists are a self-soothing technique for anxiety. I would like to embrace the chaos more. 

I love the structured and disciplined side of myself and I love routine. The “30 day challenge” part of myself is something that I love about myself and I’m not going to stop doing it. At the same time, I am challenging myself to let go of some of those mindsets—routines, schedules, and lists—as a crutch and as a barrier to my creative, spontaneous self. Being too structured definitely has a self-sabotaging effect that is holding me back from creating the life I really want. 

This month, I am doing an unstructured month in the sense that I am waking up every morning and not asking myself, “what do I have to do today?”, but “what do I want to create today?” A lot of times the answer is, “I want to create a healthy body,” and I do Crossfit and/or yoga and/or jiujitsu. A lot of times the answer is, “I want to create some fun, interesting writing.” I am letting go of my time-tracking my writing and letting my body and soul lead the way this month. In the meantime, I have found myself to be pretty productive in terms of writing and research. 

Sometimes the most challenging thing is to do nothing at all. 

30-Day Challenges: Media

 Do you remember the last time you were bored?

I mean truly twiddling-your-thumbs, looking around the room, restlessly and anxiously thinking to yourself, "I have NOTHING to do right now."  

Honestly, I don’t remember the last time I felt this way. 

I really don’t remember the last time I was truly bored out of my mind. 

It seems like I’m always doing something these days. I always have something on my to-do list to cross off, someone to text, something to read, something to study, something to listen to. 

Now, don’t get me wrong. I have been taking lots of time for relaxation recently, especially since these days I'm living in a foreign country where I’m learning a new language and meeting lots of new people. There is something about being in a new place where everyone is a stranger and everything is strange—including the language itself—that is exhausting. I take lots of time to sleep, cook, read, journal, stretch and study Czech these days. But still, I can’t say I’m ever bored. There’s always something to do. 

Especially since I’ve been living alone in Prague, I binge listen to audio books and podcasts during much of my day, from the time I wake up and want a voice to accompany me on my morning routine of face washing and tooth brushing, to the end of the day when I want something to listen to on the train ride and walk home and while I'm getting ready for bed. It’s rare that I have a moment alone or a moment of silence these days. 

You know, they say that back in the olden days--**GASP** before the TV and internet and smartphones! **GASP** can you imagine??-- that boredom used to be a part of life. In fact, many people—some of them neuroscientists—argue that boredom is a necessary precursor for creativity. 

Have you ever noticed how during times when you would have been able to sit and be with your thoughts—in an elevator, in a car, on the toilet—are now occupied by the never-ending entertainment and sounds put out by your phone? 

Not that this is necessarily a bad thing per say. It’s great to always be learning new things. My horizons—for example, my way of thinking and my background in subjects I never had the chance to learn about in school from psychology to economics—have benefitted from the ability to always be listening to an audio book or podcast. Indeed, it’s SO nice to curl up with my laptop at the end of a busy day with some YouTube or Netflix as a nice calming down routine and just pure, good ole entertainment. 

But sometimes I can literally feel my mind getting too full from all the input. Words, words, words constantly going in with barely enough time to even digest what I’m listening to. Sounds and images constantly going in in in. There’s certainly nothing wrong with this. But when I’m trying to be creative, when I’m trying to produce content for output, it can be hard to think among the noise. It’s a challenge to produce anything when my brain is constantly getting input. It puts its energy toward digesting the input instead of using some of that empty space and time to produce some new, original, creative thoughts. 

Last year, I got my book deal in May 2020 and started writing the book in June 2020. I needed to turn on new creative juices that had been lying somewhat dormant for a little while. 

Brai had done a media and music fast a few weeks before as a way to distance themself from the news media, especially anxiety-producing COVID content, and encourage themself to play guitar more often—instead of listening to music, encourage themself to produce their own music on the guitar and with their own vocal cords. 

Inspired by this, I decided to do a media fast of my own during June 2020 as I kicked off the writing of my book. 

I didn’t watch any Netflix or Youtube, didn’t listen to any audiobooks or podcasts, and didn’t read any news for 1 month. 

I didn’t go on social media either, but this was pretty easy for me since I had given up Facebook a few months before. I did listen to instrumental music with no lyrics and I did read print books. But otherwise, I didn’t read any newspapers or magazines, or look at any articles on my phone, or listen to any music with lyrics. It was just me, myself and I, alone with my own thoughts. 

It was really quite amazing the new space and time I had for my own thoughts. I would be biking, something I normally used to do with music or a podcast on, and a thought would just randomly pop into my head. Imagine that! An original thought. How novel. 

Sometimes it was a thought that came and went with no consequence. Sometimes it was just a thought I wanted to write down, and sometimes it was an idea related to my job or my book. My brain filled the empty space with its own original ideas. 

(I hear young people these days report that the shower seems to have magical qualities because they always get good ideas in the shower. Someone was quick to point out, it's not the shower that's magical, it's just the only space and time during your day that you're not with your smartphone.)

More than anything else, I just had a sense of relief in not being so overloaded with new information and stimulus all the time. I worked on my book for about 1 hour a day that month, and nothing especially special or original or creative necessarily came out of that time, but I can say that my brain felt less tired.

I was more eager to sit down to write when I wasn’t tired from all the morning podcasts and news I used to listen to. I think the media fast gave me just that little bit of boredom—that little bit of time and space with no input or output into my brain—that I needed to be creative. 

Also, the media fast seemed to re-set my level of stimuli and thus allowed me to sit down at my computer and work on my book more easily. With my brain not constantly stimulated, it had more energy for my book and also did not feel so bored looking at a screen with a lot of words. Like the sugar fast, it was like going from rich chocolate cake to strawberries. Because I was not indulging in rich chocolate cake (social media, news, podcasts, Netflix), the less-intense “sweetness” of strawberries—working on my book—was a lot more appealing and dare I say even attractive to my brain. I’m not a neuroscientist but it might have had something to do with the serotonin and dopamine receptors not being quite as stimulated and therefore being more sensitive and thus not as bored and restless by the idea of working on my book (which was quite tedious on a day-to-day level). 

Life is hard. This world is chaotic—loud and smelly, bright and engaging. Sometimes I think to myself, it’s amazing that I get anything done, really, in the midst of all this chaos. Sometimes the least I can do is give myself a few quiet moments without anything coming out of my earbuds and into my brain. 

Sometimes in the morning, I ask myself, "what do you need right now?" Most of the time, the answer I get is: “I need silence. I need you to slow down and I need you to be gentle with me.” So I’m trying to give myself what I really need and want these days by limiting my media input and increasing my creative output! I'm not being as strict with myself in terms of a "no media challenge" this month (though June 2020 was a valuable experiment), but I try to give myself some time and space to do nothing and listen to nothing, especially on walks. 

30-Day Challenges: Sugar

(In this post, I am defining sugar as "refined sugar as an added ingredient." Sugar is, of course, in all foods, especially bread, pasta, fruit, and vegetables. When I talk about giving up sugar, I mean added sugar. I did not give up carbs or breads, fruits or other foods with naturally occurring sugars like vegetables or oatmeal.) 

Sugar is one of the hardest things for me to give up. 

First, I have a straight-up addiction to sugar. I am helpless in the face of it and I have no control.

I crave sugar. It immediately calms me down, while also providing an edge of pick-me-up at the same time. When I see a candy bar in the grocery check-out line, my mouth waters, my stomach rumbles, my fingers twitch, and my legs fidget. 

All I can think about is how much I need it. How much I want it. To feel good. To feel that pleasure, to feel like I deserve a treat. To feel like life is good, all is right in the world and I have access to bodily pleasure. Sometimes I reach for the Reese's peanut butter cup and eat it right there in the check-out line. Sometimes I wait until I'm out in the car. Either way, that sugar calls to me. 

Anytime I think about giving up sugar for a set period of time, a feeling of despair and melancholy overtakes my body. I feed sad and desperate. "No sugar? But what about chocolate? What if you get invited to a birthday party and then you can't enjoy the cake? What if you want to take a special someone out to ice cream? What if someone brings you cookies?" The excuses I can come up with are never-ending. I feel a sense of loneliness in the thought of giving up sugar since sugar can also be a social activity if you are sharing a sweet treat with other people. A voice inside my head also goes, “You can’t do it, so don’t even try.”

Honestly, I feel like my relationship to sugar is not that different from some people's relationship to alcohol. It's everywhere and in everything, it's a soothing comfort at the end of a long day, a reward after a hard workout, and a nice thing to share with other people. According to the Addiction Center, some studies have suggested sugar is as addictive as cocaine. People often enjoy the dopamine release sugar brings. I can tell you for sure, I am definitely one of those people. To say I have a sweet tooth is a bit of an understatement, actually. 

I've given up sugar for 30 days three times in my life now: November 2019, March 2020 and August 2020. As I write this post, I know I want to do at least another 30 days at some point in 2021. But my body and mind are rebelling. I digress. 

The second reason sugar is one of the hardest things to give up is that it's hidden in everything. The first time I gave up added sugar for 30 days was in November 2019. Before then, I had never really fully read the ingredient lists on nutrition labels before. Now, I had to—I wanted to—look at the labels of everything before I ate it and before I bought it. That exercise was useful in and of itself simply for me to learn what kind of chemicals I had been and am putting into my body. There are all kinds of things in the ingredients of products that you would never think of. But especially sugar. 

Sugar can get disguised on labels in all kinds of ways, such as maple syrup, brown rice “sweet flavoring”, or coconut sugar. But either way, it’s added sugar if the word “sugar” or “syrup” is on an ingredient list. Tortillas and tortilla chips, cereal, almond milk, yogurt, veggie burgers, ketchup, jam, peanut butter.... the list could go on and on. There was sugar in a lot of the things that were staples in my diet! 

What that meant was that giving up sugar wasn’t just about eliminating cake and ice cream from my diet, it was also about making things from scratch. I learned how to make my own tortillas so I could have tortillas that were just made out of flour, oil and water, instead of the 10 other ingredients on the store bought ones. I learned how to make my own veggie burgers out of lentils and chick peas. I learned out to make my own hummus and mayonnaise, and other kinds of sauces so I could have flavorings and sauces without the sugar. 

My roommate Maddy did the no sugar challenge with me that November. She is super creative in making things from scratch and she showed me how to make my own cashew milk (hint: grind up soaked cashews and water in a blender and you’re done). She made her own ketchup so that we could avoid the sugar but still have burger night. She was super encouraging to me in making my own things out of scratch and showed me how to use the food processor so I could make my own pesto and Lara Bars (aka date balls) without added sugar. She showed me how to use the blender so I could make a lot of my own food since it was literally that hard to find food at the grocery store that didn’t have any added sugar in it.  

(I still ate fruit and thinks like oat milk, which have naturally occurring sugars from the plant but not added refined sugar.)

As strong as my cravings were, I have to admit that I felt so much better when I wasn’t “on” sugar. I slept better for sure—I wasn’t indulging in late night ice cream binge fests. I was able to have more sustained energy throughout the day—I didn’t have the post-lunch afternoon crash after sugary who-knows-what in my lunch. I was able to exercise harder and longer because my insulin and sugar levels were able to maintain a steady level throughout the week. I turned to other sources of comfort when I craved the soothing feeling of a sugar dopamine rush: self-massage, a warm bath, warm cup of tea, or a soft blanket.

It was interesting how my body craved sugar the way an addict would. I fed the cravings by eating lots of fruit and dates, and even some artificial sweeteners like stevia and xylitol—I allowed some of those sweeteners when I really needed something sweet because they do not raise blood sugar levels, and my goal was to see how my body felt without the insulin spikes. 

It was also interesting how once you go off sugar for 30 days, your sensitivity for sweet things is heightened. Previously somewhat bland flavors--like bananas--become like heaven and very sugary things like candy become too sweet to handle. 

But man, I’ll tell you, the joy of ice cream and chocolate, cakes and cookies, it’s hard for me to part with. That’s the nice thing about the 30 day challenges, it’s manageable enough to stick to. But that’s also the bad thing. If you have a long-term addiction like I do, it’s so easy to “fall off the wagon” again as soon as the 30 days is over. Nevertheless, I recommend that everyone try 30 days without sugar both to see how your body feels without the spikes of insulin, and also as an exercise in reading all the labels of the food you are eating—you might be surprised about how much sugar is added to your foods, but also the other chemicals that you are ingesting as well. 

30-Day Challenges: A Little Adventurous, A Little Crazy: What one-minute of positive affirmations did for me

Summer 2018.

I set the timer for one minute on my phone. The clock started counting down: 00:59, 00:58, 00:57. 

I looked up at myself in the mirror. I leaned in really close, like I would if I was plucking my nose hairs or popping a pimple. But I looked slightly up from my usual gaze trajectory, away from criticizing my skin and towards my own eyes. I made eye contact with myself. 

“I love you,” I said aloud. The first time I did it, I laughed at the absurdity of it. But I couldn’t deny that I got a warm fuzzy feeling in my heart space when I said those three words out loud to myself in the mirror.  

During a heart-to-heart conversation with Terrence about my feelings of unworthiness the week before, he had asked me, “Do you love yourself?” 

“No,” I responded, shaking my head. 

“Try looking at yourself in the mirror every day naked,” he suggested. “Really admire and appreciate your body for what it is, what it does for you. The muscles, the bones, and the skin, all working together to keep you going. And while you’re at it, make eye contact with yourself in the mirror and say ‘I love you’ until you start to believe it.” 

I knew it made me feel good to say nice things to myself, but like many things healthy and good in life (or so it sometimes seems), this practice got pushed to the side and forgotten among the busy rush of life. When I rush from sleep to CrossFit to shower to work in the morning, I just didn’t have time—or the mental space to add that to the list of things to do. Who has time to stop and look in the mirror to say “I love you” and other nice things to themselves every day? Not I. Still, I thought it was a nice idea and kept telling myself, “I should really do that more often.” 

December 2019.

Fast forward to the end of 2019. I was thinking about my New Year’s Resolution for 2020. I already knew I wanted to try being vegan for the year. But there were so many other things I wanted to do as well! Keep a budget. Give up alcohol. Meditate. Write down my gratitudes. If I did all of them, I wouldn’t have time for work! (Note to self: when you retire, do ALL of the things you always want to do.) Talking among some friends and partners, I got the idea to do 12 New Year’s Resolutions throughout the year, doing a new one each month. Brai had also inspired me during 2019 when they were doing different "moon challenges" during the phases of the moon, such as giving up refined sugar and wearing blue light blocking sunglasses in the evenings. In true Tynen fashion, I made a Google doc. 

In the end, the list numbered over 60 things I wanted to do as monthly challenges: creative writing in the morning, stretch for 5 minutes, keep a journal, read for 15 minutes, do 10 minutes of yoga...the list went on and on. (When I decide I want to do something, I go HARD in the paint. Some people call it being “open to trying new things.” Some people call it dogmatic. Some people call it passionately stubborn. I prefer the terms “adventurous and a little crazy.”)

“One minute of positive affirmations in the mirror,” I wrote on the list as one of the challenges.

“One at a time,” I told myself. 

So I started going down the list in January 2020, when I kept track of all my spending. In February 2020, I gave up alcohol for the month. In March 2020, I did 5 minutes of creative writing each morning. I’ve had a lot of interesting experiences, so I decided to do a blog series about some of my experiences doing these challenges over the past year and a half. And here we are. 

March 2021.

I never did get around to the positive affirmation challenge in 2020. But fast forward to March 2021. I was living alone in Prague during COVID lockdown and writing a book about genocide in China. I needed those affirmations and I needed them bad. Enter the “one minute of positive affirmations in the mirror” challenge.

In the morning, my hair sticking up in countless directions, my cowlick in the back sticking up like TV antennas on the back of my head, my eyes sleepy and dry, crusted with sleepy sand, my joints achy and my muscles tight, I would hold the sides of the sink and lean in to my bathroom mirror. My throat dry and my mouth chalky from morning breath, I would look at myself in the mirror. Most days that month, every fiber of my being told me, “This is too hard. You should just give up.” I felt unworthy and stupid, tired and defeated. I would stand there gripping the edges of the sink and remember my goddamn 30-day challenge. I would look up from the sink crusted with old toothpaste from the night before and make eye contact with myself. 

Alone in my studio apartment where no one else could hear or judge me, I would say out loud, “Saar, you GOT this. I know it’s hard, I know it sucks right now. But you are smart and capable and strong. You have good ideas. Your research, your words, your experiences are of value to this world and to the Uyghur people. You have something of value to say. You are a good story teller and a gifted writer. You can do this. I love you.” The timer on my phone would go off and I would continue about the rest of my day. 

That got me through some really dark times when I honestly just wanted to give up on everything altogether. 

Sometimes I would forget in the morning. In the middle of the day, I would stand up from my computer, put on my mask, go to the kitchen, find the key to the bathroom, walk down the hall to the physics department across the way (yes, going to the bathroom was a bit of a production), and take a couple minutes' break from writing to pee and wash my wands. Looking up at myself in the mirror, I would say, “Saar, you are creative. You are a good writer. Your research matters.” I would go back to my office and continue writing. 

Sometimes I would come back home from the office, exhausted and stiff from a 12-hour day sitting at my computer. I would look up at the bathroom mirror and see my tired eyes and dark circles and bags under my eyes. Then I would look just ½ inch upwards, into my own blue-gray eyes and say, “You GOT this. Only a few more weeks/days left. I love you.”

And I did that every single day for 30 days. 

By March 29th, I’d finished the first full complete draft of my book, no less than 100,000 words and 323 pages. On March 30th, my 32nd birthday, I rested. 

Why 30-Day Challenges?

Some people think I’m too rigid with schedules and too hard on myself. I have gotten so much criticism from people who think that I don’t give myself enough days off or that I’m too dogmatic, stubborn or inflexible about rules. People say I'm too strict with the plans and boundaries I put on myself. I understand their feedback. But when it came to this challenge in particular, I’m so grateful for my ability to stick to routines and schedules. I’m grateful to myself for my 30-day challenges like this one that force myself to do something I wouldn’t normally do in my everyday routine.

At the end of 2020, being vegan for the whole year was the first time in my life I had actually stuck with a New Year’s Resolution for the whole year. In the meantime, I had a list of 30-day challenges that I had tried throughout the year. For me, trying something for 30 days is a lot more manageable than 365. It’s a mental thing, but in this high stress world, who has the emotional space for ALL OF THE HEALTHY THINGS. Nobody. So I just do one thing a day to make my world just a little brighter. 

I still have that Google doc and I'm still making my way through the ever-growing list which is now called "Potential 30-Day Challenges for 2021." I hope you join me on this blog post journey about some of those things and try some of them yourself.

In the next several series of blog posts, I’ll continue to write about 30-day challenges that I’ve learned from. I invite you to think (and DO) some of your own challenges, or else think of ways your life might benefit from little changes you can make throughout your day.