Self-care: Learning to Shut Down

Sometimes the best way to take care of yourself is to just stop. This seems to be particularly true when what you most want to do is gogogogogo.

I’ve been away from home (and from regular internet access) for five days, teaching a workshop in NYC, with stops on either end in Virginia to visit my 6-month-old nephew (who has my hair).  And although I’m chomping at the bit to write my belated weekly review, and to postpostpost all of the insights and thoughts that have been bubbling up during my travels; and although I’m struggling not to beat myself up for not posting on Friday, the fact is I think the Universe is trying to teach me a lesson.

And that lesson is to stop.

Notice that I’m not quite stopping yet, I’m still typing. Because I really don’t want to learn this lesson.

Although I have a self-concept that I’m a lazy person, because I have resistance to doing things that don’t compel me, the fact is I’m an extremely driven person. And probably the hardest thing in the world for me to do is just chill. Take a breather. Stop.

The Universe is much wiser than I am – I know this! – and keeps trying to get me to take a little rest every so often, but I, like a cranky two-year old who doesn’t want to go to bed, usually do my best to ignore the hints.

Eventually the hints get more emphatic: I’ll get sick, or I’ll get a migraine (as I did on Friday while participating in a panel on the business of calligraphy, streaming live on the internet).

And right now migraine tentacles are snaking their way around my cranium again, so instead of continuing to type — which is what I really want to do — I am going to take the damn hint and stop.

Instead of compulsively writing all the thoughts that are spinning around in my head, or scribbled down in my notebooks, I am going to model excellent self-care, turn off the computer and go to bed. I am going to do the hardest thing in the world and forgive myself for not getting done everything I wanted in the time period I wanted, and actually go to bed.

If you’re a driven sort yourself, you might take a page from my book and do the same.

It’s quite likely that the world will still be there tomorrow.

Over and out.