Introduction

(**NOTE, 10/29/09**: This post, and all posts between 9/18/07-6/2/08, were part of a separate blog I started when I thought I'd grown tired of this one. But now I see the point of leaving it all in the same place. ;-) As you were...)

I'm not usually one to describe things in my life as "blessed", but I feel that way more and more these days. Doing so denotes a belief in someone-doing-the-blessing - and despite my mother's best efforts, I don't think my Catholic upbringing has resulted in much more than an optimistic agnosticism. I do often feel like there is "SOMETHING out there", although I think I subscribe more to a Buddhist philosophy of our own interconnectedness, than to the ruling hand of God/guilt/sin...the sour taste of which reminds me only of the many people I've met whose hypocrisy in spiritual beliefs vs. everyday actions defies justification. I am open to other opinions on the matter, and I'm certain there are good Catholics out there...

Nevertheless, this is NOT a post about God. :)

This is a post about simplicity, life, love, doing the right thing, commitment, planning for the future, personal growth, sustainability, health, and positive thinking. This is about the fact that I am cautiously optimistic about the choices I've made in the past two years, and the growth that has come from that.

This is also about always having something new to learn.

I am trying on a daily basis to remove the unnecessary and unimportant things from my life. A recent, big help in this effort has been found from Zen Habits, a great blog about just that - simplifying your life, and the happiness that come from that. It was only a year ago that I moved out of an apartment and thus ended a stage in my life which was NOT simple, and on that day I consciously decided that purging the clutter was the first step on a much clearer road. This applied to all sorts of clutter - physical, mental, and even the "clutter" of people whose influence was not a positive one. It's worked. I still have some "things" to get rid of, but for the most part, everything I own is something I need - and yet, I'd be happy to get rid of even more if I ever need to. It's a good feeling, not being attached to physical things. It's also convenient when you're someone who moves a lot. ;) I've also removed a lot of the people and thoughts that caused more grief and anxiety than friendship, and although my circle of friends might be very small, I feel blessed by having such good people in my life.

Honesty, truth and trust in my friendships and relationships has been the second thing I've tried to focus on in the past two years. I have never been very good at keeping in touch with people at a distance, but I've tried harder to do so. (In the "Bane of my Existence" category, the award goes to Myspace, without which I probably would not have the continuous contact to a lot of my distant friends. Without it, however, I'd probably not have wasted so much free time over the past year! I've had more success at breaking that addiction these days - but still, having a link to all those distant friends in one place has been beneficial for me and made it easier to stay in touch - you just have to ignore the stalker/drama factor that everybody gets so worked up about.)

If you do not learn from your mistakes in life, and make conscious efforts to not repeat those mistakes, then you are living that basic definition of insanity: repeating the same action over and over again and expecting different results. If you learn from your mistakes, take note of the effect they had, and commit to keeping that in your mind to affect your choices in the future, I guarantee you will be a much happier person. I feel blessed right now because I feel like I am accomplishing that. I try to remain aware of how my words or actions might affect someone else - to treat people the way I want to be treated. I am by no means perfect at any of this, but it's the daily successes at doing so that make it worthwhile. I look back on people and events of the past two years and think about how much happier I am, and I'm certain that it's been the right way to go.

I am also really blessed when it comes to my relationship right now. I almost hesitate to admit how happy I really am, because in the grand scheme of things, it might still be "new", yet I am very satisfied with everything so far. I feel so lucky, every day. I've found this great person to spend my time with, someone who I believe has been honest with me, someone who really means it when he says he loves me, someone who I trust to do the right thing. I'm humbled by it, because I have spent so much time trying to grow and mature in all these other areas of my life, and I want to be as good to him every day as he has been to me. Unlike a lot of my other past relationships, I actually know that I am treating this person the way that I want to be treated, *and* I'm getting that in return. I am happy to go off and do my own thing, and happy to see him do his own thing, too - but I am also fulfilled by supporting him in his things - and I think he wants to support me in the things I do, too. It makes me happy to be trying to work out things in my own life, and yet to also have this person who I think really appreciates me, and who, I hope, knows that I appreciate him and adore him for all we've done together so far, and for all the dreams he has, and for all the ways I think we might be able to work together as time goes on. I want him to know that he has really helped make me a better person, too. He is mature and confident in himself, and that makes a huge difference. He has had a big influence on helping me figure out the things that are most important, and I really respect him for that. He has also stood by me through some really difficult things, and I think it's those sort of tests you need to go through in a relationship that strengthen your ability to grow and continue on together.

So, this is my introduction to this blog. My commitment to writing waxes and wanes, and as personal as this post is, I'll probably end up with a lot more posts about nothing much at all! We'll see. I chose the name for two reasons: Simple, because that's how I want things to be, and Ginger, because not only is it something that I love - to eat, to smell, to drink in yummy tea or beer! - but because it IS simple. I enjoy cooking, and as with any natural ingredients, ginger is one of those strong, recognizable, simple things that is both good and good FOR you - and those are the kinds of things I want in my life:

Strong, positive, simple things that make life good on their own.