Okay, this insight is now freaking me and bringing tears to my eyes. Anxiety is all about doubt, doubt that God is there in your life and taking care of everything, doubt that you have the ability to handle whatever situation you're presently facing.

I didn't get this one, and it's so simple it's like DUH! I thought my anxiety was maybe everything else that was going on in my life but not doubt. I thought I had pretty strong faith, but I guess not.

Maybe faith is like listening. The extent to which you listen is about the extent to which you know you don't listen. I always thought I was a good listener, until I watched how much my wondered when I was listening to someone.

So having a strong faith would be the extent to which you have faith is about the extent to which you know you don't have faith, which would mean paying attention to the times you doubt. But doubt is so subtle and it sneaks up on you, and all the great spiritual teachers say that doubt is the last to go, always the last and the hardest to give up.

Not having doubt would mean complete surrender and I've never been able to achieve that ever, because I'm too smart and I think I always know better. And I love being smart and thinking of myself as smart and just thinking in general, and yet it always stands in the way, always shows up as a huge weakness in my life. But how you can stop doing something that comes so naturally? It's like so painful and so hard.

I just got what I think is a cool insight today. There's this thing I've been fearing might happen or might not happen. I wasn't really looking forward to either result, and it was driving me crazy. But then today I realized that if the thing happens that I fear, it will be fine because my life always works out and I can adapt easily to all kinds of situations. And if the thing doesn't happen, then that result will be fine as well that means the situation has ended and I can look forward to another thing starting up.

So like whatever happens I can't lose really, and I'm like so glad because I like to think of myself as a person who always lands on their two feet. I might be a little wobbly at first, maybe a little more than hurt and wounded but basically intact and able to move forward.

I heard a great sermon on TV this Sunday and the preacher kept saying that in the bible it says "This too will pass". And you know what, the preacher man is right. Life is always changing, never staying the same. If there's anything I can count on in life is that it's going to change, and this is a good thing. Change is good. Change means that bad situations get better. And isn't this a good thing?

I have been living out scenes like Mia Farrow's character in Woody Allen's "Broadway Danny Rose", which is one of my favourite movies. If you've seen the movie, you'll get the reference.

I don't want to jinx myself but I woke up happy today, happier anyway that I've been since November 29. I hope it lasts and lasts and lasts. This is my one christmas wish, that whatever anxiety I've been going through these last few months stop and I go back to being somewhat carefree and happy go lucky self who loved the life she was leading.

I went through my writing papers today, and I found 15 writing projects that I've started and are in various stages of completion. There are stories I finished, and I want to keep working on. There are stories I started, and I'm not even sure I'm even interested in writing them anymore. I found some notes for a weird story I was interested in writing called "The Unsettler", and I couldn't believe I had written this story about a group of murders taking place in the West Virginia hills. I'm reading my own handwriting and thinking, where the heck did I get this idea from?

I'm going to type up the notes for the story only because they're so bizarre, but I'm not sure I'm ready to write a murder story. I'd like the story to be a short story or maybe a novella, but not another long novel. Novels take so long to write, and I don't have the patience for writing them.

I'd like to at least finish one story this year and I decided that since I'm going to Texas for the holidays, I figured I might as well finish the novel I started in 2003 called "Texas is a state of mind". I've got 3.5 chapters to go. I managed to finish 1.5 chapters this year, which is sad.

My writing productivity for 2004 has just been really, really bad. The stress of having to find a new job, then starting a new job really took a toll on my writing. I started writing again just before red-haired guy came into my life, but then things went emotionally haywire for me and my creative writing practically ceased. I've been writing like mad in my personal journal, but not story writing at all.

I've got to really get a handle on that in 2005. I think my life functions much happier when I'm writing and I feel productive and creative. I have to figure out how to make writing a habit. Journal writing is a habit for me. Blogging is habitual most of the time. But I can't seem to make creative wriitng a habit.

Some people at Nanowrimo were blogging their novels online. That would be wild to post a novel entry every day for people to read. It would be bad first draft writing and who wants to come across that and read it on the screen. Yucky!

I'd like 2005 to be a big breakthrough year for me with my writing, where I develop good writing habits and start finishing stories and sending them out. I think it's the next step in my writing process, but I have no idea what I'm going to have to do, have to give up in my life to get to that point.