Be comfortable with being uncomfortable

So, I've been asked a lot by many kind people how I'm doing. My answer has been usually to say, "I'm good. Still adjusting. Some good days, some not as good days." All of those answers are true. It takes time to adjust to an entirely new lifestyle, new environment, new weather, new food, new people, making a new comfort zone, new culture, new language, new school, new work, new everything. I've been in Jordan for 1 month now and overall, I really do like it here. Amman is amazing! It has almost everything the US has as far as utilities, food, shopping, etc. Fun things to do and go, the culture is historic and interesting as well as the people themselves are very kind here.

Its been fun to learn these new things and explore new places as well as make new fiends and learn a new language. Something that usually happens to me when I get in these new situations is that I get so distracted by all the new-ness that I don't remember to take inventory on how I'm feeling or dealing with it all. Eventually, as all emotions that get ignored, the feelings force themselves in and attack. I have been attacked by stress and anxiety. Mostly, I've been not feeling well a lot off and on and getting a lot of migraines, which for me, typically equals stress/anxiety. Especially lately were my Arabic class has decided to learn two new chapters a week instead of one, I started interning in the afternoons and I have a bit of a "perfectionist" issue so I've been studying like 4-7 hours a night on top of it. All the new-ness causes stress, but especially Arabic right now. I've been living and breathing it since before I got here.

I read what I'm writing right now and I realize that if this was someone else writing this I would be saying, "Calm the heck down!" (except I would probably use a curse word or two)I need to calm the heck down!!

I know. That's not something I've ever been good at really. I like to fix things, be proactive, make it better, etc. I'm not so good at the waiting or give it time thing. I was talking to my roommate today and she said something that stuck with me. She has been studying Arabic for years now and is at level four, which is know as almost Advanced, which is really good when it come to Arabic. She said, " Arabic is one of the hardest languages for native English speakers to learn. It's up there with Mandrin. You can't do it all and you're not going to understand everything, especially your first year. You have to learn to be comfortable with being uncomfortable!"

So, thats my new motto now! I need to learn to be comfortable with being uncomfortable. I have to really learn to let it go and allow myself to go slow with the language, not be so hard on myself to be perfect at what I learned in class that day and most importantly be OK with not "fixing" everything all the time. My perfectionism has no place in the Arabic language world for now. Its the hardest freakin' language ever (or so I have decided) and I'm going to do my best to learn to love being uncomfortable. Oh man, this is gonna be a challenge...