Do it all over again
Some people like to save all of their laundry for one day per week. I like to do it as often as I can get a full load together. (Image by Ryan McGuire)
The thing that surprised me most when I went back to my old life for five months was how much I hated the commute.
After spending most of the pandemic in Maine, I went to Atlanta for a semester to close down The Little Middle School this past spring. Having spent years living in Atlanta, I knew what I was in for, but I was not prepared for the stress and dread I felt each day when it was time to hit the road each morning. Had I experienced this over the previous twenty years and just not noticed?
I spent years at a time without a car, and I managed to live within walking distance of my office for periods of time. But I also did house calls as a music teacher and math tutor and willingly chose to move to the suburbs twice, so I don’t think commuting used to be as a big a deal to me. However, it’s a dealbreaker now.
This was a good reminder that preferences are highly individual. What works for someone else might not work for you. And this goes not just for the mechanics of your lifestyle, but for all of your personal and professional choices.
Therefore, if you’re going to commit to a particular path, make sure it’s one that you like. As the novelty wears off, you’ll be left with certain routines and practices that you’ll have to repeat several times a week or even several times a day. Let’s hope that you enjoy them.
This is on my mind as I ramp up my coaching practice to welcome new clients. Am I ready to spend more hours a week on the phone and Zoom on top of what I’m already doing?
Luckily, I eagerly anticipate the calls I already have. But it’s definitely a question worth asking. Whatever I’m doing today, how willing am I to do it all over again tomorrow? If I feel anxiety or despair when I contemplate this question, I will need to make some changes.
Over the years, I’ve tinkered with my various activities in order to make them more sustainable. If I didn’t enjoy writing every day, I wouldn’t be doing it. If it made me miserable to get on Zoom calls, I would try to set things up in a way that didn’t require me to do so.
And if I hated mowing the lawn, I would try to live in a place where I didn’t have one.
If we look at someone else’s choices and it brings up feelings of inadequacy, it’s important to remember that whatever they’re doing that would be difficult for us might be easy for them and vice versa. It’s great if we’re inspired to start lifting weights at the gym or putting our kids in cloth diapers because someone else does, but it will only work in the long term when we find a way to live with doing these things day in and day out. If an activity never gets any easier and always feels like a burden, we might need to find a different path.
Suffering can be virtuous, but not all of it is. Some of it is just silly and unnecessary. If you don’t like working out in the morning, you can work out in the afternoon. If you can’t bear the thought of having a second child, stick with just one. If you are overwhelmed at the thought of replying to every email, quit doing it. We can revisit virtually any assumption we’ve made about what makes us happy or successful and find alternatives that suit us better.
One of my biggest clues that I need to change something is when that feeling of dread creeps into my days. If the thought of doing it all over again tomorrow is an alarming one, I either need to focus on staying in the present or making edits to my routine. Maybe both.
These days, I have no more commute and I am much, much happier. However, I do miss spending time with adolescents every day, which people thought I was crazy for wanting to do in the first place. That was never the hard part.
Whatever you want to do, I hope you can find a way to do it in a way that suits you and causes you to look forward to doing it all over again the next time. Your way may not be the way someone else would do it, but it’s no less valid for that.
