Why struggle? Drop that crocodile!

American crocodile (Crocodylus acutus). This photograph was taken at La Manzanilla, Jalisco State in Mexico, on the Pacific Coast. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

For the umpteenth time, my life felt like I was wrestling a large, wet, thrashing and dangerous creature — a crocodile, as it were — that was the drama du jour. It might have been the crappy relationship with my mother, half-brother, stepmother, an editor (or three).

It might have been a fight with my sweetie, now my husband. It might have been my own insecurity or fear over my weight or my work or my income.

The more I wrestled with it, the more it thrashed, its scaly and powerful tail smacking me in the head, metaphorically speaking.

Hold it tighter! Make it submit! Then I had an epiphany, one that’s shaped my life ever since.

Drop the damn crocodile!

Just drop that slimy scaly sucker and walk the hell away.

Oooooh, that feels so much better.

It’s counter-intuitive for some of us to let something drop, to allow it to simply not matter anymore. We’re taught never to give up. To try our best. To work at things.

But, you know, sometimes that damn crocodile will kill you if you keep hanging onto it, its ferocious strength draining all of yours as you keep wrestling it.

Here are just a few of the crocodiles I’ve dropped in the past few years:

— obsessing about my income. And, funny thing, it’s rising, up 40 percent in 2011 over 2010. I expect 2012 to rise even further. Neurosis is rarely appealing to anyone, especially clients.

– whining about my weight. I need to lose 40+ pounds. I could go nuts or just try to do it in my own way. I’m working on it. It will take months. Whatever.

– worrying about whether or not I’ll be able to sell my  next book. Probably will.  If not, something else will come along.

– caring what my Dad thinks. Yes, I still do. But not nearly as much as I used to.

– keeping a spotless home. I used to waste a whole ton of productive work-time on house-cleaning. Now we have a maid coming twice a month, for a total cost of $110, which is less than my lowest hourly rate. I have more time to make more money.

— fretting over the normal costs of running my business, like my web designer and hiring paying assistants and lawyers and others for their help and expertise. Outsource! It’s all a tax deduction next year anyway.

– managing some of my business associates. Too difficult. Time to move on.

– trying to please my mother. Impossible. We no longer have any relationship at all. Sad to say, I have never been happier.

– keeping up friendships that actually left me feeling miserable. Just because someone was once a dear friend doesn’t mean they’re going to remain one. You change, they change and habits that might once have seemed normal can become unworkable. If you’ve tried to resolve them and it’s just not going to happen, time to drop that croc.

– getting my hip replaced.  Two years of increasing pain, exhaustion, depression and frustration are gone since I had a new hip implanted in February 2012. I was terrified of the surgery and a poor result. I have my life back! I’m happy and strong once more.

What crocs are wearing you out these days?

Can you drop a few of them?

When Family = Stress

If only it was really this calm! Image via Wikipedia

No matter how much we look forward to visiting our distant family members, (and many of us do), there’s often a whole pile ‘o unexploded ordnance lying beneath that linen-covered holiday table: resentment, envy, insecurity, fear, doubt.

No matter how much we’d love to ignore them, they often blow up when you least expect them, or want them to. Here are some of the old standbys:

When are you getting married?

You still don’t have a boyfriend/girlfriend?

How’s that “freelancing” thing working out for you?

We had such a great time in Paris — how was your summer?

You’re still ABD?

Billy just got a promotion, and a bonus. Did you find a job yet?

It’s so great they’re making plus-size clothes in such pretty colors these days. Love your dress!

Having just survived the latest “helpful” advice from one family member — which left us both shouting in rage (nice) — I know all too well the joys of spending time with relatives who have firm and fixed ideas about how much more effectively or wisely one might behave.

It takes a soul of steel, (not to mention duct tape), to not let old patterns re-emerge, snitty comments get under your skin or ancient feuds simmer to a boil with the addition of alcohol, overeating and too much time in a small space with people you never got along with in the first place, shared genes be damned.

Right now, my mother isn’t speaking to me (I’m her only child); my half-brother insists it’s him or me at Christmas and none of my husband’s relatives (all two of them) could bother attending our recent wedding.

Family, schmamily.

What are you most looking forward to when you gather for Thanksgiving?

What are you dreading?

Drop That Crocodile!

Image via Wikipedia

Do you ever find yourself feeling like your life has turned into a crocodile — large, wet, scaly, heavy, unwieldy?

Thrashing wildly in your arms and trying to snap your hands off?

Time to drop that sucker, stat!

Right now, here’s what’s happening in my life, all at the same time:

My new book, “Malled: My Unintentional Career in Retail” (Portfolio) comes out April 14, and I have hired two fantastic assistants, paid from my own pockets, to help me promote it. That means: setting up events and readings, finding people to blog and review and write about it, finding places to promote it on-line, setting up a book tour, etc.

My mom is in the hospital in another country, a six-hour flight away, facing surgery then moving into a nursing home. That means, as her only child with a shared power of attorney with another woman, finding buyers for, and selling: her car, home, contents and finding a nursing home. And managing all her affairs.

My right hand has two weird things happening at once, including a finger that clicks internally and needs to be seen by a doctor and I am sick to death of doctors.

My left eye has finally stopped looking like Frankenstein, bloodshot for a week, quite likely (you think?) from stress. The doctor warned me that until the stress has subsided, it could happen again.

My left hip, which has dead bone in it, makes walking difficult and painful. Now that New York, where I live, is covered in ice and snow, I walk like a Japanese lady in a very tight kimono, praying I don’t slip, fall or shatter that dead bone, forcing me into immediate hip replacement surgery and an eight-week recovery.

I was threatened by a fellow blogger who said he wanted to “beat me bloody” . I don’t laugh such threats off, and called the police, who investigated him, even though he lives in Florida and I in New York. FYI, making such threats is a Class B misdemeanor and carries jail time.

It’s been fun!

But the point is….how to cope?

Drop the bloody crocodile!

By which I mean, and here is the real silver living in it all, it all teaches you to take a break from whatever stress you can. Heave it, like that nasty croc, as far away from you for as long as possible.

Because it will kill you.

I met a woman yesterday to talk business. She’s lovely and passionate and very beautiful, but has already had one heart attack from stress and, after we met, I can see the next one lurking. She is driving herself at industrial speed. She sleeps very little.

So here’s what I’ve been doing to de-stress, and all of it works really well:

Pedicures

Movies

Long lunches with very good friends

Long phone chats with very good friends

Sweating it out at the gym and dance class

Sleeping as much as my body tells me to, if that’s 15 hours in one night, so be it

Taking naps during the day, if necessary

Drinking a lot of water and fresh juice and being careful about caffeine and liquor consumption

Reading some terrific books (Keith Richard’s “Life” is one)

What are some of your stresses?

What do you do to cope with them?