BETTER LATE THAN NEVER!

This article is overdue. I do not mean its subject matter is stale or untimely. I mean it was due hours ago, and I sit here this evening, in my living room, just beginning really. I did not intend it to be overdue. That was not my goal. I try to pick an inspiring or entertaining message to share with you all each month, ideally based on something I have experienced or hope to, or some tidbit of wisdom I have picked up along the way. This time you just get me … me in this moment.

Somewhere along my lifetime, I have heard, and used, the phrase “just keep it between the ditches.” (How very Southern, I know.) Some days that feels like a big ask. I don’t know if it is recent travel, a heavy court schedule, numerous deadlines, emerging client “emergencies,” seasonal allergies, or unsettled weather, but I am tired. Balancing professional obligations, interpersonal relationships, family needs, and self-care is always a challenge, a challenge that I like to think I am better equipped to conquer with age and the passing of time, but today isn’t that day. I have hit the wall. I am at the ditch line.

So, I have decided to just be honest about that and write about it. I admit that I have now scrapped the draft of the hopefully inspiring article I had begun to write but could not manage to finish on time. Instead, I thought I’d share with you my current status and some strategies I use to get past these kinds of days when they visit. Maybe something here will help if you ever have one of these days, as we all do.

This too shall pass.

A moment is here, and then it is gone. Whether that moment is a happy one, a sad one, or an exhausted one, it is unequivocally just a moment. It cannot be regained and there is no purpose in dwelling on it, another moment is on the horizon. The next moment cannot be chased, it always arrives in its time. The only moment one can exist in is the present one, so I choose to exist in the moment that is, knowing it shall pass and be replaced by the next.

When I am stressed, tired, or generally feeling low, I have found that it helps me to get whatever it is from inside my head to outside of my brain and body. Sometimes that might mean writing down my thoughts or journaling, or writing an article about it, I suppose. If you are the praying or meditating type, those can help too. Sometimes it means taking a walk, listening to the birds, feeling the breeze, maybe getting a little sun. Sometimes it means selecting a playlist featuring the songs that evoke the mood I want to be in and fully committing, singing loudly and off key at the top of my lungs, having a dance party of one, or both. Regardless of the method called for in the moment, movement of my feet, the rhythm of my own breath, or the stroke of a pen will make me feel better and release my worries outside myself.

This may seem like a strange suggestion, but often when I find myself unduly stressed or exhausted it is because I have allowed my own boundaries to bend. Remember you set boundaries for yourself, not for others, and you are the only one who can stick to them. My cell phone has lit up three times in the last hour, as I watch the sun set, hours after the “workday” should be done. I think I have been answering it too frequently lately under similar circumstances. Tonight, I am putting another brick in the wall of my boundaries, and that cell phone is going silent in another room. No need to act, no need to explain. It will wait.

Grace.

I am also going to give myself some grace. Dinner tonight will be a chunk of whatever cheese is in the fridge accompanied by whatever cracker awaits in the pantry. No chores are going to be completed. No additional work will be done. I’m just going to finish writing this journal entry to share with my KBA family and sit. If I get really ambitious, I might turn on the television and find something mindless and fun to watch for an hour. I might just cuddle up with my pups and read a bit before bed. I choose to give myself that grace. I’ll start over tomorrow and try to be just a little bit better than I was today.

If you are having one of those days, I hope you recognize it, maybe remember this article, and select a technique that works best for you. Take the time. Have a rest. Feel the grace. Keep it between the ditches. Thanks for listening. I feel better and more energized already.