Pandemics are a marathon, not a sprint (GUEST BLOG)

Hello you overachieving eager beavers.

This is Amy's sister, Leah. 
 
What are you doing?   Are you doing something productive today?  Planning to cross something off your to-do list?   Going to file your taxes, fix the dripping tap, get an early start on your holiday cards, trim your nose hair?
 
F%$%$k it.  No more.  Not on my watch.   Put down that tantalizing check list and seductive black marker. 
 
I want to talk about the art of ‘not now’.
 
This winter, let’s all measure our lives by the things we are choosing to not do.  Not yet anyway.
 
I’ll go first.  And I am a task-driven, dedicated doer. I even have a freaking blog to track my projects.  Holy I am crazy.   But I can change.  This can-do, get ‘er done, cross-the- finish-line obsessive is slouching into a reclined and relaxed position. And I am not going to feel guilty about it.  
 
They were right. The pandemic is a marathon and not a sprint.  And as someone who has the experience of running (a half) marathon, it is tiring as shit.  It’s exhausting.  And you wake up, do another run, and continue to be exhausted.   And another run.  And another.  
 
But good running programs include protected time to rest and recover.   You can’t achieve your PB (personal best) without quality rest periods.
 
Amy (THE Earnest Platypus) talks a lot about self care and I have been using those sentiments to push her to take things off her to-do list.  I haven’t been successful in getting her to stop things, but she has been willing to slow down or pause things.   Interesting.  Pausing is more palatable than stopping.

I think that many of us can accept a pause over a full stop for activities because what we do is valuable to us.  We love the process or we love the output. We want to do those things!  We want to volunteer. We want to put all our photos into a book.  We want a clean and tidy house. We want to recover those cushions.  We want to make our lives full and rich of meaningful memories. Stopping can also feel like a failure or a waste, like all the time you put into something to that point is now lost. 
 
So keep doing ‘all the things’, but maybe is it a question of timelines.  Not ‘if’ but ‘when’.  There are so many interesting and exciting things to do, but do all those things need to happen now? Now now? Probably not.   And if you do them all at the same time, a lot of them will be crappy. 
 
My survival tactic for the next six wintery months is to edit my activities. I want to do more of the things I value, and not fret about the crappy things that probably don’t matter.  I also want to be okay with not getting everything done as quickly as I would in normal times.  I’m going to slow down, push a few things into the future, and give myself a break.  
 
I’ve made a good start of ‘not now’ this year.   I filed my taxes late (so late) and the world didn’t end. Abe got his birthday present five months after the cake. I got my winter tires off in July.  I have returned half-read books to the library – I may never know who killed Tobias (in the living room, with a candlestick) but I also don’t care.

I can read about it next year.   

Until next Sunday,
The Earnest Platypus