REVERSE-THINKING IN EXPERIMENTAL DESIGN

I started writing this post weeks ago after reading this article Hypothesis-driven fluorescence microscopy - the importance of reverse-thinking experimental design because it pertains to my job. The article started feeling like a personal attack. So, I started reevaluating the goals I set at the beginning of the year, but some of the blocks I’d put into a particular place shifted into a new place. It’s like I built a very specific pyramid structure with alphabet blocks sometime in January and now that structure looks like steps, really wonky steps like the ones in my basement. That last one is a doozy.

I have been writing here, spilling my guts out for all to read for twenty two years. With each posting, I think I’m being real vulnerable and brave in my sharing, but honestly, I never get that queazy-oh-my-god-i-can’t-believe-i’m-putting-this-out-there feeling when I hit the ‘publish’ button. That queazy-oh-my-god-i-can’t-believe-i’m-putting-this-out-there feeling has happened more times in this year than ever before and has had nothing to do with blogging. At the beginning of the year, I filled out a form answering some really hard question, for Self Care Circle. The questions were part of Human Design and the answers determine what kind of human you are. I am a Generator. Look, you know me. You know how I feel about auras and energy bodies, but I have to admit that there is something in the description for Generator that resonates. As a Generator, I am not a chaser of life. I am at my best when I have to make a decision or have an interaction if the moment comes to me. I need to wait for the moment.

Well, the moment came or I’ve gone off script.

I saw a thing and when I saw it, my heart said “yes!”. For a week, I sat with that yes while doing nothing but thinking about that yes. And I know I’m being vague, but I’m just going to have to be vague about the thing because the thing is not important (yet). The important part is that the thing I saw made me really question my own complacency and complete lack of ambition. I settle into whatever is comfortable and easy, never really pushing myself. This thing caused me to push. It’s made me giddy and simultaneously nauseated. I’ve had to think about what it means to feel valued and if where I am currently is meeting that need to feel valued. Is feeling valued in what I do important to me? I think it might be.

Just a little.

I have no expectations. Either something will happen in regards to my yes or nothing will. For me it’s enough that I did the thing that I was scared to do and put myself out there in a really vulnerable way.

THANKFUL FRIDAY

Today, I am meeting my friend Nurse Jen, for lunch. She was our camp nurse at Camp Wildling, but she’s also a nurse in real life, working in very stressful conditions at a local hospital. She posted something in her timeline earlier in the week that made me think that she had more than reached her limit of dead people and COVID. So I reached out to check in with her mental health. We made a plan, set a time and a place and everything, to meet. I felt like I deserved a gold star for following through because I am usually in full turtle mode during the winter. I can’t wait to see her and do what I can to lighten her life a little right now, be some ears to things she needs to rant about and some healing comic relief.

Follow through….sometimes that is not my forte.

Michael made reservation for Farina for my birthday last weekend. We knew the restaurant was going to be fancier than our usual restaurant experience, but I don’t think either of us were prepared for just how fancy it turned out to be. On top of the impeccably placed table settings and service, the food was exquisite. I started off with a gin cocktail and dozen oysters. Michael started with carpaccio, which is basically a plate of thinly sliced raw meat. He’s had this dish before at another restaurant and when I tried it, I told him it tasted like nails. He assured me that this did not taste like nails. My oysters were followed up with a shrimp and pasta dish that was light and lemony and spicy. Michael had roast served on saffron risotto. We were both so pleased with the meal and the experience that I suggested we put this in the budget. I said that we should pick a new fancy place once a month or every other month. So we did. We didn’t wait or hesitate. We sat there and parrused restaurants until we agreed on one and then Michael made reservation for February.

It was a very satisfying moment.

My friend Alice, when she introduced me to her partner, said “Cindy is the person who says she’s going to do something and then does the thing she said she was going to do.” I was surprised by this. I am still surprised by this observation of my personality. I feel like, oh so often, I fail to follow through with things that I want to do. I realize now that you, the audience, have no idea of all the things I don’t end up doing because I don’t ever say the thing I want to do out loud. For every one want that gets voiced, there are twenty others inside my head and it is the twenty other unvoiced wants that I end up fixating on. My plans with Jen, the advanced reservations with Michael, both of those things were spontaniouse moments. They are moments where I didn’t hesitate or pause to over think the pros and cons. I just took action.

I’m grateful for the reminder that I am the woman who says she’s going to do something and then does the thing she said she was going to do.