2021-10-29 — Domitable 🙃

The day started off so well. I was pumped.

Even though last night my brain wouldn’t shut off, so it took a long time to fall asleep, and when the alarm went off this morning, the first second I thought something like “I’m exhausted,” even with all the, the second second (🙃), I though, nope, I’m gonna get excited and get going, so I flew out of bed, and did 10 pushups (or however many it was) to get my blood going and get me moving.

Then suddenly… I was good. I was excited. I did my 5×5 — which included putting a new sheet on my bed and winterizing my bed (because we we went from Summer to winter all of the sudden 🙃 [winterizing means adding the comforter to the layers]), cleaning the bathroom a little more, cleaning… gosh I don’t remember what, pulling rocks out of the weeds on the little hill by the compost pile, so it can be mowed, which will make the yard line look a bit nicer, as it’s sort of a section of weeds that juts out into the yard. And I spent some time working on the trash in the driveway a little bit as well.

What else… Right. Meditation, reminding myself: I am love (working on it, at least 😊). The obstacle is the way. I will not be deterred. I am indomitable. And on and on for a decent little while, focusing on who I want to be. 🙃

Then I ate breakfast, worked on planning the work day. Then I did something I never thought I’d do: I bought a membership to Audible (thinking of all the books I want to listen to that will teach me, inspire me, etc.). So… I did that! 🙃

What else did I do? I bought a domain name. 😁 I’m really excited about it, though it doesn’t fit what I wanted the name of my organization to… communicate, I still like it.

TheIndomitable.org

“Indomitable: Impossible to subdue or defeat” (Oxford Languages)

I really like it.

I don’t know if it’s gonna be the name of the organization, but… it’s something? And I was excited about it. 😊

Indomitable.

No Excuses.

Then I realized, I think as I was listening to motivational speeches, that I haven’t carried my goals to the end vision (or however would be best to communicate that). My goal was exercise every day to be get my cardio good and whatnot, but why!?!? What’s the vision? What’s the dream? Why am I doing that? What’s my vision? What’s the end goal that helps to bring the energy and the passion and the determination?

So… with my goals that I’ve been setting, I’m going to be writing out my vision–the dream I’m working toward. The dream that brings the fire of the soul!

So far, the approach of working on me in order to help me figure out the nonprofit has produced fantastic results.

After the NP stuff, I busted out a bunch of tax progress. I’m making really good progress. Really good progress, and I’m excited to finish.

So why the title today? Domitable?

Because I slipped today. Pretty badly, actually. The first job was fine, but I somehow way overbooked myself. I don’t really know how it happened. I said no a bunch, but I guess I said yes as well? I don’t know. But the first job went just fine. The second job, was one I shouldn’t have taken. I had a lot to do, and it was an emergency job for a stranded hot-shot driver. I shouldn’t have taken the job. took me probably 3 1/2 hours, and it’s still not done. 😕

It wasn’t too frustrating, but it did give some sideways moments that made it take a lot longer, mostly because I don’t know diesels, so I didn’t know what I was looking at trying to figure out which part to order. Eventually, I figured it out, and I was able to get the part ordered, but it won’t be here until tomorrow, and I’m swamped tomorrow, partly because I had cars to do, and then the rain came, and now I’m slammed, and anxious.

Then the third car… came right after a really discouraging phone call with someone I thought I might start working together with on nonprofit stuff. It just hit me harder than I can express, and all my positivity went out the door, and I was really discouraged and a little down.

When I get hit hard like that, it sucks the life out of everything for me. Suddenly, the things I’m passionate about, just… don’t do it for me.

So I was struggling.

And I wasn’t listening to motivational speeches to keep me going and to keep perspective.

Then came the third car. And of course it was a nightmare. I shouldn’t have taken it. But they were stranded in the Walmart parking lot. They’d just moved down here… and on and on. So I said yes. I went down there as my third and last job, and it kicked. my. butt.

And if that weren’t all challenging enough, the people didn’t have the money to pay me but didn’t tell me that until I was in the awkward place of stopping in the middle of the job and leaving them stranded still and being paid for what I’d done to that point or choosing to trust that they would pay me the balance in payments over time.

You’ve probably read about how often people who don’t pay at the time of service actually pay me later.

Yeah.

And the job had been going sideways six ways from Sunday, and then they tell me that.

Right.

And of course they beg me to trust them (like everyone does). They say they’re trustworthy (as everyone does). But I see the meth-user looking face and the missing teeth. I find that they slept in the car last night because they don’t have anything but what’s in their car… And… I’ve heard that before and seen that before.

But… I didn’t want to leave them stranded, so even though the money they had would cover only a little more than what I was charging them for the starter, and they’d still owe me nearly $300… I decided to finish the job because I only had like 15 minutes of work left to do, and… I didn’t want to leave them stranded.

And then… the job went sideways to the enth degree, and I just… lost it. My full-blooded sailor got raised high on the mast, and I was seething thinking of customers who don’t tell me they can’t pay until it’s too late.

By the time I finally got it all done, around 9 p.m. or so, having kept my plan to not start a new job after six but having this one kick. my. tail… I was angry, discouraged, struggling… And I thought, do something nice Stephen. Take the $200, don’t charge them the other $300ish. Do it nearly pro bono. It’ll help you get back to a positive place, and it’ll help them get a leg up, if they take advantage of it.

So when he asked how we’d set up a payment plan, handing me $200, I said, “Don’t worry about the rest.” He thanked me. And I left. I struggled on the way home. I haven’t eaten almost anything yet. It’s almost 11. I’m pretty stressed right now, though listening to the motivational speeches I’m listening to is helping a bit to get me back to good. I’m trying. I’m fighting. Domitable?

Indomitable.

I want to be one of The Indomitable. 😁

I’ll get this.

Lift the World. 🙂

~ stephen