Monday, January 4, 2016

BACK TO WORK

What are you “going back to” today? For most people it’s WORK. Last night and this morning, social media was inundated with people bemoaning it, in their own words and with memes, (some pretty funny), about going back to work.  My friend shared this one:


Regardless of how you feel about your job, even if you enjoy it and find it fulfilling, the resistance is sometimes more about going back to the structured routine, including getting up early and ‘doing’ the commute. For many people, with and without ADD, we have a love/hate relationship with unstructured time. (I use the term we here, because I absolutely fall into this category.)  We crave it and love it because we hate HAVING to be places at certain times, or doing things that we just don’t feel like doing at that moment, (especially if we finally got focused and are being productive) but we SO need it to survive.  When we have big chunks of unstructured time, there are just so many choices and possibilities. It’s awesome!  And HORRIBLE! It often triggers serious inertia and paralysis.

For some folks, these feelings of inertia and losing time may actually have occurred during the time off between Xmas and New Year’s and truth be told, many are actually relieved to get back to their routine. But even so, there is often a sense of disappointment, sadness and general crankiness that not enough was done, whether it be projects or just plain fun and relaxation.  For the people who are not at all relieved,  now it can be JUST. SO. DIFFICULT. TO. MOTIVATE.  With all of the built-in deadlines, imposed “necessities”, freer eating, drinking, playing and napping surrounding the holiday season, the adrenaline and dopamine were in high supply.  And now…. CRASH.  Before, there was overflow; now everything seems to be in short supply: energy, motivation, positivity, food, time, good feels…

Although many people do feel a sense of renewal, currently and temporarily charged up by New Year’s Resolutions, this is not the case for everyone.  If you are one of the people feeling a bit lost, you are definitely NOT alone!

Although it's not my intent in writing this to simply provide “tips”, there is one thing I would like to suggest:

If you notice you're judging yourself for feeling like this,
or“shoulding” yourself about your state of mind… 
STOP THAT!

You feel what you feel and if you resist what is, you are just wasting precious energy. Sometimes, that simple allowing is enough for you to soften and breathe more easily and that just might be enough - for now.  Also, when you give yourself permission to feel what you are feeling (even if unpleasant) often, a natural shift occurs.  If nothing else, you buy back a bit of energy which had been lost with all of that TRYING (and failing) to feel something other than what you are actually feeling.

If you’re not currently enjoying that sense of positivity and optimism that the new year brings to many, I’d love to hear from you to get an idea of how you are coping with this “back to work/routine” time of year.  I also invite you to share what you are doing, or what you have done to re-charge or to find new clarity and motivation.  Hey, and since I do tend to look on the bright side, here’s something good to think about: the sun will set at 4:25pm today, which is 3 minutes later than it set on January 1st.  :-) 


posted by Amy Falk at 2:16 PM

2 Comments:

Blogger Therese Kay Creative said...

Ah, yes. The curse and blessing of unstructured time...

January 5, 2016 at 8:03 PM  
Blogger Amy Falk said...

It's a true double edged sword, isn't it?

January 7, 2016 at 9:18 AM  

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