Success

I've been thinking a lot about success recently, as is likely to happen when one moves back in with their parents at 27.

Ever since I was little I've had the habit of comparing myself to other people. Gauging my success or perceived lack there of in relation to others. This is a bit of a slippery slope when one has the talented, yes, successful, driven and hard working friends that I have. And I am so thankful for the people I do have in my life. I realize I'm lucky to be in a position to have a home to return to, to have people to live with. It's difficult to think of these things without feeling like I'm being a brat and not being gracious about the things I DO have.

I find myself in a funk, not having things go the way I thought they would of, expected them to, or wished they would of. I look at other people's lives around me and wonder, why can't I have what they have?

Yet, I have to remind myself that they have their own struggles, they may have started in a different place than I did, may have wanted different things than I did, and maybe even, feel like their life is different than they expected or wanted.

I was talking with a friend the other day who was struggling with some of the same issues of comparing themsleves to others and she said something along the lines of, "yeah, it's a baby step, and maybe not as great or good or wonderful as what that other person over there is doing, but it's MY baby step god dammit"

and that's stayed with me. Floating around inside me.

It's mine. 

and that's what matters. That's what counts. It doesn't matter how it looks compared to someone else, or to someone else. It's mine and I need to own it.

No one else is going to decide what my life should be, or make it what I want it to be. I'm looking outside for the answers I need to be looking inside for.

So, here is another resoultion for 2013.

Look in, not out.

Try to stop comparing myself to others. Because it doesn't do me any good, it doesn't do them any good. It keeps me from truly being happy for my friends and those around me, because I'm focusing on myself, and that's a shitty feeling. It's wrapping my stuff up into their stuff, and that doesn't need to happen. It's scattering my sense of self, looking at others lives when I have a perfectly good life here in front of me.

in, not out.

Summer Knit Along: Week Never

If you were with me over the summer you might remember the Sweatshop of Love knit along that I did. Last time I wrote about it, we were in week four. I had fallen far behind on the Loop Tank Top but was making decent progress on the Makeup Your Mind, and then, I just....stopped. I stopped knitting, I stopped writing.

There were a lot of other things that kept me away from the blog this summer, some good, some not so good, but after I dropped the ball on my knit along a big one was guilt. I felt guilty for not keeping up with it, I felt guilty for starting to write with out addressing it, My guilt kept me from writing about it. It paralyzed me. In the spirit of resolutions for this new year I have dubbed 2012 the year of action. This is a year of doing. Of simply picking up the pen, the mouse, the needle and starting something. These projects have two very different endings.

The Loop has been frogged and returned to it's original form. Wound and ready for...something. I still would like a Loop Tank Top and plan on making one in the future, but I know that this project doesn't need to be completed right away. There are a lot more projects I am itching to work on and if I've learned anything from last year it's that you need to follow your energy and passion where it points you. I'm sure I'll be dying for one of these once the sun starts to peak out a little more and the weather doesn't require multiple jackets.

My Make Up Your Mind however is much further along. Almost done, really! I only have a few inches of laces to finish on the bust and then I need to separate for the arm holes. I plan on throwing this back in the rotation and hopefully you'll see it as a finished project up here soon. It feels good to be letting go of my guilt and worry and starting to replace it with decisions and action.

Resolutions

Six days into the new year and most people have written their lists of resolutions. They have looked back on the year that has passed, reflecting on what has happened, perhaps thought about successes, assessed what they would like to differently in the future for those less successful times. This blog is no different. There are many notes that I have scribbled down over post-its on my desk or the pages of my journals and one of them dirrectly relates to my knitting.

You see, earlier this summer I had the idea to knit a sweater for a very special gentleman in my life. I worked, in secret on this sweater waiting, until I could reveal it as the perfect, well thought out, and crafted with care present I envisioned it to be. As I was knitting it, I kept having the nagging feeling that something wasn't right. But I pushed those feelings down and kept blindly following the pattern. I've been known to go rouge on patterns at times, and I was determined to put my head down and follow the pattern to the t. All of this was going fine and dandy until the gentleman opened my gift, and prompltly drowned in my sweater.

You see, I had knit something large enough to fit not one but TWO adults. So, this sweater had to be ripped out and knit over again. I was able to save the sleeves and just rip back the shoulder caps but the entire body was a gonner.  It languished for months until I mustered up the courage to start ripping that sucker out. Over Christmas I recast on. I'm hoping to finish it by end of February hoping that it can see some sweater weather this winter.

In frogging this sweater I started to think about some of the other projects I have that don't work for me. Although I loved knitting The Dollar and Half Cardigan. I've never actually worn it. It was the first sweater I made and there are some changes I would make (like remembering I have the worlds shortest arms EVER and I need to not knit the recommended lengths, ever.) Other sweaters like The February Lady, just really aren't my style anymore. So, I have made an executive decision. I need to be using, and loving the things that are in my life. 2012 is all about making what I have work for me. The February Lady has been frogged for good, and the dollar and half is in the process of being frogged to be re-knit. Sometimes it can be hard to re-do projects, or to let go of them all together but there's no use in keeping them in my life when they aren't working for me. This year is about doing more with what I have and one of the ways to do that is to re-purpose the things that are already in my life. Sometimes that means letting go of things to make space for something new and sometimes it means starting over, and trying again. The best part of re-doing a project is getting to use the experience of making it the first time around. Thanks to Allyson for being my co-model and here's to 2012.