Hanging Out With Myself

One of the things I don't think I've ever been particularly good at is hanging out by myself.  I grew up in a large household and then went on to boarding school where I spent the next six years living in dorms filled with other girls.  I had roommates throughout college and then immediately moved from my last college apartment to a place with Nate.  I've never actually had to spend any significant time alone, so I never really did.

The strange thing is that I'm not an abnormally social sort of person.  I'm probably not even a normally social sort of person.  I'm really more of a homebody; I enjoy spending nights in, eating and hanging out at home.  When I'm not staying at home, I like getting outside of cities and away from crowds (and to me, there's really no such thing as "too far" -- if I can still see buildings, we've got a ways yet to go).  But I enjoy doing all of these things with people, my people.  Nate, my family, my close circle of friends.  I've rarely done a single thing without someone in a long, long time.

I honestly don't really know what I'd do if given the chance, and that's sort of the problem, I guess.  Shouldn't I know?  Shouldn't I know what sort of activities I like to do on my own, and then be able to do them?

As part of the first week of Stratejoy's Joy Equation course, I'm going to have to spend a few hours alone doing something that's meaningful to me, and I'm having the hardest time figuring out what that something will be.  I can't really get out of the city because I'm still not very comfortable driving on freeways (don't worry, after recognizing how this has limited me, I've realized it's something that needs to change), and shopping is out of the question altogether.  My initial thoughts are to either spend my time writing or cooking, since both are things that I value in my life but that have fallen to the wayside over the last few years.  I'm also thinking of trying out a yoga class for the first time (the first time!).

Whatever it ends up being this time around, I'm hoping that hanging out with myself is something I can make a conscious effort to do more of more often.