It’s ten-thirty at night, and I’m house sitting for a friend, a different one than I house sat for last weekend. I spent the day at home–Mom and Dad’s–and have been here (where I’m house sitting) for several hours now. It’s the cutest place, this old house with low ceilings and kitchen sinks. Earlier I stood up out of the recliner in the living room and almost hit my head on the ceiling fan. I thought, Holy crap, I’ve grown! All that stretching must be paying off. But then I remembered it was just a matter of “everything’s relative.”

The little-ness of the house really makes it feel cozy, comfortable, and safe, like a cocoon. My therapist and I talked recently about how my room at my parents’ was basically the same thing, a protected place for me to grow, to transform. That’s how this house feels, like a little getaway right in the middle of town, a place where I can hang out with my friends’ animals, sit on their porch and sip coffee, and read.

Reading. That’s what I’ve been doing all day, all damn day. This afternoon I finished a book I started last night about the world between 1650 and 1720, when pirates, or buccaneers, sailed the seas, and how a large number of pirates were homosexuals, either because they were born that way or because there aren’t a lot of other options when you’re stuck on a ship for years at a time. This is something I never learned from Disney’s The Pirates of the Caribbean, the fact that they didn’t call it the Jolly Roger for nothing.

After finishing that book, I started another one this evening–about alchemy and how it relates to personal/spiritual transformation. This is an off-and-on fascination for me, the idea that we can change the lead in our lives into gold. I just like the metaphor. It resonates with me. Anyway, I read tonight until I got to the point in the book that included visualization/meditation exercises that are meant to be built upon–like you do one one day, then another the next. And whereas I’m excited to learn and try new things (and it never hurts to slow down, close your eyes, and breathe), I wish I could just read the damn book and be done with it.

Technically, I could. I realize that not every suggested exercise in a book is a “required” exercise. But I do like trying them. I mean, there’s a part of me that, believe it or not, would be content to just read, read, read all the time and learn, learn, learn. But learning isn’t just head-stuff. At some point, if it’s gonna make a difference, it’s gotta be embodied. Take dance for example, it isn’t just something you talk about, although you can. It’s something you DO. In my experience, it’s the same with personal growth. You have to live it. Hell, if all it took to be mentally and emotionally healthy was to post a meme about it, the world would already be a better place.

Unfortunately, growth takes more than just talking about it. As my therapist recently said, “It takes more than buying a Brene Brown book.” Personally, despite the fact that I love to read about personal growth, the only reason it’s more than a concept for me is because I’ve matched my reading with actions. Over the years this has looked like anything from a number of different meditation practices to having tough conversations, setting boundaries, and even ending relationships. And crying. I’ve cried a lot. Tonight it looked like a visualization exercise, an exercise I’m probably going to have to try a few times before I decide whether or not it’s doing any “good.”

This is my main gripe with books or teachers that give you exercises to do–if you do all of them every day, it eats up a lot of damn time. For example, for three months after knee surgery I not only did my rehab exercises every day, but also a form of meditation and writing for this blog. But recently I dropped the form of meditation in favor of other things (including going to bed) because it was just too much. That’s the pressure I’d like to take off, the idea that you have to do everything you start for the rest of your life. My inner student gets so excited about learning and thinks it has to do things “perfectly.” But that’s ridiculous–there’s no such thing as perfection. Plus, learning it should be fun, not burdensome.

I repeat–learning should be fun, not burdensome.

And another thing–I’ve already read more and learned more than some people ever have or will (a gay pirate, for example). So again, “everything’s relative.”

Earlier I took a break from reading to eat dinner and starts tonight’s blog. While I was in the kitchen, I let my friend’s cat in from outside, and he’s* been basically glued to me every since. I swear, he lay on the kitchen table eyeing me eat like he’d never seen a taquito before. As I’ve been writing, he’s been in and out of my lap. Y’all, it is so hard to type with a feline sprawled across you. That being said, his purring and stillness remind me to slow down, to not rush, to let all things, including myself, unfold in their own time.

[*I honestly have no idea whether my friend’s cat is a boy or a girl. It’s so hard to tell these days.]