Compromise, Patience, and Conservation (sometime in October)

There are times when I am going to find myself with everything and other times, with nothing. It’s an interesting interplay- an interplay to keep in mind when becoming frustrated when resources run low. Things most certainly do not come on demand here, not that they did in the states, but the ease in which things could be attained was not so tedious. I am learning patience which was one of my primary objectives, and compromise. I feel that the two go hand in hand. I am learning a trail exists to attaining what is desired - where there is a general progression, perhaps in the direction of improvement – and how this needs to be maintained consistently or else digression will occur.

The simple everyday trials in patience: I cannot be well accomplished in washing clothes the first go around, or be accustomed to showering with cold water from a bucket with a small Tupperware container in the cold. It’s a gradual progression to learning the technique. Soaking clothes in one bucket (starting with the whites first), wringing them out, moving to the second pail with detergent and using a scrub brush, board and sometimes ‘special soap’ to scrub and remove stains, wringing clothes out, progressing to third bucket, wrinsing, wringing, then to fourth (to adequately remove the detergent), but performing the last wringing before putting the clothes on the line, while strategically placing the few number of ganchas, or clips, so that clothes do not fall into the dirt and/or fly away. And with the shower. Bending forward 90 degrees to wash hair first and wring it out before washing the rest of your body so, a) you can prevent a mop of hair from making you freezing, and b) you can start the hair drying process. I am so happy I chopped my hair before coming.

Okay, the application to more pertinent, and perhaps more important aspects of life. Learning Spanish, Peruvian Spanish that is, and well that changes when going to different regions… and doing presentations in Spanish on health related topics that may or may not be new in content. It’s easy to adapt to speaking a very basic level of Spanish - communicating enough to get by with transport, small purchases, and superficial level of conversation, such as the most meldrum of topics – the weather. But, if wanting to feel outside of yourself, because being introverted all the time can get tiresome, expanding to topics of politics, the environment, art, philosophy, religion, can really be stimulating and enriching. I can approach these subjects, and was able to earlier on, but keeping a steady pace, and varying my vocabulary - I need to work on these. And I so want this to come immediately, but outside of my already busy schedule of training, I need to allocate the time. Really focus on engaging myself to retain and exercise comprehension. At the end of the day, it is so easy to want to recede and shut off for the day, which may or may not be appropriate.

I don’t have much patience with myself for performing, and so I am working on this. I can’t be perfect on presenting a topic, such as self-esteem, lactation, nutrition, etc., in Spanish, when perhaps, I may still have been hesitant to approach these topics in English. I have to accept I may suck the first few times I present - just smile and laugh at myself, and hope my audience can be accepting. The first few times, I probably will suck, and that’s okay, I need to accept that, because I can get better.

Conservation of time and energy, there are time when they can be exuded and times were they are already exacerbated.

It’s a scary notion that some things just may not happen, even though you feel so strongly about accomplishing these things. You really have to dedicate yourself to prioritizing because those more predominating priorities will take precedence. And how to work with a realistic time frame because it always seems like the desired outcomes come later than anticipated…