Wake, work, sleep, repeat

Wake, work, sleep, repeat … A relentless wheel of motion, a journey that seems to be full of important day to day goals, clashing with the struggle of day to day stresses.

Work demands, family commitments, health priorities and basic life survival (Where did I park the car? What on earth’s for dinner? How do I dry the wet washing from the machine in 10 minutes to wear to school?) all clang and compete. They are noisy and demanding. They can suck the joy out of the simplicity of living. They can make you forget your “why” and instead fill your head with dreams of how to escape.

After a year of sticking to just one speed – flat out – I am reflecting on all the stresses that I’ve dealt with – on each time I’ve thought “when I just get through this it will all be ok” but, like a series of tidal waves, I no sooner emerge exhausted and short of air from one wave then the next one plunges me down the sheer face of a merciless surge of new stresses, demands and I set a whole new vision of how it will feel when I survive that deluge. Of course, I never get there, to the other side of that wave of stresses.

Call me slow, but I’m realising it’s not enough to get through the waves, to survive the onslaught, to simply “just keep swimming”. You see surviving is an admirable goal when you have a natural disaster unexpectedly thrust upon you, but I really don’t think “surviving” is good enough when you’re referring to a life you’ve actually built for yourself!

I think there should be more balance and so I’ve been starting to realise (again, call me slow all you like, but it really takes some time to realise the predicament you’re in sometimes when you’re really very tired!) that to do more than just survive the waves that have been exhausting me, I’ve got to do more than swim – I’ve gotta build a boat.

Now it’s not easy building a boat when you’re already in the middle of this proverbial ocean of tidal waves. Nope, not at all. And if you stop swimming, well you sink. But if you don’t do something you’re going to sink anyway as it’s just not sustainable (if only all this proverbial swimming was actually doing my fitness any good!).

So the dilemma becomes one of understanding how you simultaneously swim and build your life raft? How do you essentially save yourself?

So far this is what I’ve got:

Do not view all the waves coming at you at once, otherwise it really does feel like a disaster is approaching. Just look at the one wave immediately in front and get over it WHILST planning your raft. Here’s the important bit – you’ve gotta start planning how you’re going to build the raft. It can’t wait till you get over the wave. You’ve survived all the waves before. Trust yourself that you’ll float on over that big wall of water and start mapping your rescue boat.

Build a big boat. Yep, make sure the plan is good enough to get you out to the ocean. No good clinging to a single coconut branch, you’ll only run into trouble (although if it has a coconut attached that would be damn handy). In other words, make it a solid and robust plan. I’m good with that so far.

Resources. You gotta check what resources you have. Ask for help. Get someone to build the boat or at least waterproof it. Pay someone. Team with someone. Just get some resources in …

That’s it, that’s as far as I’ve got, I figure once I’m above the water I’ll be able to work out where to sail this boat and get to calmer seas. I’m all for adventuring and I’m all for endurance sports.

I’m all for setting big goals and I’m all for sailing big seas – I’m just realising that you really need to stop swimming by yourself.

What a woman wants is calm waters for her to achieve the perfect balance off work, family and health but what a woman needs to realise is that calm waters never made a skilled captain.

So go navigate the roughest seas, climb the biggest hurdles – just don’t throw your entire self in without a boat, a map and a rescue plan.

Hope you’re all surviving this month.

With love

Abby

PS you can reach me at [email protected], I love receiving your emails each month, thank you x