How I’m treating my plantar fasciitis.
I have a stubborn case of plantar fasciitis and I’m not responding well to acupuncture treatments. Instead of getting better, my heel pain is getting worse. Because of this, my acupuncturist is not happy. When he reads my body, he says the reason I am not responding well is because I am under too much mental stress. “Do you feel stressed?” he asks.
I’m writing my memoir and feel great anxiety about it, like I have to get it all just right, right now. I worry that the other writers in my critique group won’t like it. So, sure, I’m feeling a lot of mental stress right now. My practitioner says I should put all my energy into healing and reduce all mental stress as much as possible. For this reason, he suggested I take a break from writing. “Just while you are healing,” he said.
Wanting this heel pain to go away, I took his words to heart. So, what have I done this weekend instead? Read other writers’ personal essays. All that did was make me want to write. Last night, I couldn’t sleep. At four in the morning, I thought, stress be damned. I’m more stressed out not doing what I itch to do. What I love to do. Express myself. Consequently, a little over twenty-four hours after my commitment to take a break from writing, I opened my laptop and worked on my memoir.
“The reward of patience is patience,” says Saint Augustine. What that says to me is I need to write my memoir for me first, not anyone else. I think I’m stressed because I’m trying to be a perfectionist and am too focused on the outcome.
I must let go of the outcome and let the words flow in their own time and at their own pace without judging them. Maybe the pain in my heel will go away if I stop stressing myself out.
Impatience is my Achilles heel. I think I’ll follow my heart instead, do what I must and go easy on myself.