GIVING UP IN 2020

Happy 2020. It’s a new decade in history. It’s a new decade in my life (just turned 30, sup). If you’re like me and feel bright eyed about the future, and also like me, seem to slide into overwhelming dread over all the things you want to do and things you want to change – hey. How are you. Are you okay. 

Our cute NYE feast

BEING HUMAN IS HARD.

It’s hard because I want to listen to Miles Davis. I want to read books, and memoirs and histories and watch documentaries. I want to know everything about Miles Davis.

I also want to make money blogging about nothing so I can keep traveling and doing nothing but eating. I want to learn French and Spanish, I want to read poetry, and learn to cook and publish a book, and quit self sabotage, and negative thinking and meet new people who challenge me and keep adding new cool things onto my plate so I can keep learning, and seeing and experiencing and doing and and and and.

2020.

I don’t have answers. I’m no good at human-ing either. But I do know that if you’ve been fighting something for a long time and it’s still winning, it’s time to come at it from a different approach.

Happy to announce I’m giving up the juice. I’m off the sauce. I quit drinking. Bye binging because I’m sad, uncomfortable, overwhelmed. See you never always having six drinks, spending more money than I have. Get lost being so hungover I waste a whole entire day in bed. I don’t need it. It brings me nothing but pain. I’m not much for moderation, and I know it from 10 years of failing at it. Time to just stop literally suffering. Time to stop trying to hold onto something that I straight up don’t even need. Not even a little.

Me double fisting after a weekend of telling myself I was going to quit

I’m ready to learn French and Spanish. I’m ready to sell a book I wrote finally, I’m ready to make money doing shit I like so I can keep doing shit I like. I’m ready to not wake up feeling like shit, then being disappointed in myself so much so that I just repeat the cycle. I’m ready to learn so much about Miles Davis that I’m the law on Miles Davis.

I HAVE SHIT TO DO, OKAY?!

But I can’t be the only one ready to move up.

Please. PLEASE. Tell me what you’re happy to say good bye to this year. Comment below, hit me up on Instagram, send it in the mail. However you need to get rid of habits that have been holding you back, lemme hear it. Put it into the universe. 

And after you write that down, tell me what you’re replacing it with. What’s something you’ve always wanted to do? What’s something you’re going to hustle for this year?

The truth is, for a lot of us, we are entirely too capable of having everything we want. The things we want are hard to achieve, but that doesn’t mean we’re incapable. Many of us have people who love and support us. We’re smart, capable, strong and determined people.

If you have a dream to [insert literally anything], just do the thing. Figure out what it takes, break down the steps. Do the thing. That’s all it takes. Why not now? Why not at the beginning and the end of a pretty big moment in time (in my life. Do it for me).

Need help? I’m not a therapist or a doctor, but I am happy to be a solid support system. Sometimes it’s easier to overcome hurdles when you know someone is rooting for you.

Let’s stop adding our scared, angry, bored, tired, hungover, unhappy energy to the world, okay? If the least you can do to contribute is make yourself proud, then please, please do it. We will all benefit. 

Ok wait it was actually kinda good though

I’m not doing a project this week because I need time off. I’m still working on eating healthy, drinking more water, editing my book, traveling through Madrid and then London. I’m still learning to cook, practicing my French, listening to Miles. I’m certainly not slacking this week, but I’m hella gonna give myself a chance to catch up on all the really dope things I’ve decided to add to my life over the last several months of blogging. 

I’m also prepping for Volume Three which is actual madness. She was an ambitious Jac, Volume Three. If I pull off even some of this stuff my entire life will be different.

Or, more different, I guess, than it is right now… never mind my life has actually always been really exciting chaos. Wow, that’s an unsettling but slightly sexy realisation.

I will say, Tiny Jac wanted to give up fries and muffins which is fine. I haven’t been able to digest those in at least two years anyway. 

Thanks for being here. If you’ve been here once, if you’ve read three posts, if you’re my mom and have read them all. Thanks for even clicking the link if you don’t read. I’m gonna keep going because this makes me happy. And you guys deserve that as much as I do. <3<3<3

Listen to Miles Davis. The smoother stuff like on the album Young Man with a Horn (skip “Chance It” if you need that sleepy rainy day feeling).

Wish me luck this week, and good luck to you.

On Being Joyful

Last week JACLAND took on the task of being “joyful always.” And just as I suspected, “always” is the hard part.

I wrote about it more here. Being joyful isn’t easy, especially in this world we’ve created both internally and externally.

My quick suggestions are as follows:
#1. Journal. Write your thoughts down. Sometimes it helps you work things out, but for me it’s nice being able to look back and see how far I’ve come. See that though times get hard, I bounce back.

#2. I suggest reading The Four Agreements by don Miguel Ruiz. His concept of using impeccable speech is valuable in our own self talk. Our thoughts about ourselves are negative, so we don’t value the thoughts we have that are positive.

#3. A good book for unlearning negative thoughts is The Happiness Trap by Russ Harris (I suggest the illustrated version). He observes negative self talk in a different light. Perhaps we can hear the negative thoughts, but we don’t need to accept them.

I enjoyed researching this, and the practice of some of these behaviors has been really positive. I could talk forever about it.

But I won’t, cause I’m sick.

One moment I was eating pancakes, the next my throat swelled up and my sinuses clogged.

Fortunately for me, Tiny Jac was sick all the time (she had mono in this volume) so she was Down with the Sickness, if I may. She had routines, tricks and tips to avoid relapse when her immune system had regressed to that of a baby.

“All the stickers I’ve gotten from my recent visits to the doctor”

In the span of eight weeks I had been through mono, pharyngitis, laryngitis, multiple sinus infections and then this:

6-6-06 (didn’t see the correlation at the time) 8:35am
“I have pneumonia. Well, the doctor said so but she said she’d send the results to radiologist & see if they think different. But now I’m taking pills (only 3) again. New this time is they’re having me sniff and inhale drugs. Yeah it’s sweet. I’m pretty shore I’m a druggy. I’ve taken 5 different kinds of pills, syrup, and I’m sniffing & inhaling. My body is going to be so dependent. I need a new journal soon.”

Lol. Well just a few days before, she thought she had a pretty good plan:

May 31st, 2006
Help the process of getting better:
-Vitamins
-Orange juice
-Go to bed @ 9:30 (NO EXCEPTIONS)
-Eat 3 meals a day
-Don’t go anywhere big (doesn’t include getting (not staying at) coffee/bubble tea. Go to the store and get what you went for. If hanging out w/ppl, hang out at home)
-gargle w/salt water
-organics
-veggies
-naps, sleep
-If too tired, don’t do it!
-Stay clean”

To all the people I’ve dated who can’t handle my bedtime, sorry if it saved my life once. Sorry if I took “NO EXCEPTIONS” super literally.

I’m gonna take really good care of myself this week, and also chug NyQuil and sleep forever until one day the sun shines again.

Wish me luck and send me stories of how you stay positive when your entire face is leaking.