What's the rush?
What's the rush?
A look at what we're racing back to when we head back to normalcy.
Last week in our course work we were required to focus on savoring and gratitude. There were many ways to go about this, but we needed to complete one thing that we savored and at least one form of gratitude per day. At the start of quarantine, I have to admit that I was terrified about being stripped of my normal routine. It is one that is completely packed from the moment I get up until the moment I fall asleep on my couch watching whatever TV show I have on that day. I rarely got a chance to slow down and I also rarely minded that! I'm extremely passionate about what I do, and when I'm not working I do my best to connect with the people most important in my life. I make conscious efforts to set plans and reach out. I want people to know that I care about them, that they're thought of, and that they're a high priority of mine. As you can imagine this doesn't really leave much time left in my day. Even the single day I take off during the week from work was used to catch up on social activities or housework that I neglected during the week. To say that these shelter in place orders were an extreme flip of the switch for me is an understatement. Once my workload drastically changed I started to drastically restructure my days.
Coping mechanisms
That led me to one of my favorite coping mechanisms...Just. Keep. Moving. Springing in to action is something I know how to do well. I often can rely on my tenacity and endurance to push me through a difficult situation. Immediately I tried to fill my day with tasks. Luckily, I found this course to take at the recommendation of a wonderful friend. Having this as my guide post, I began designating different hours of the day to different activities. My day started to shape up like this:
7:00am- Wake up, take Theo out, feed Theo, and make breakfast (while listening to NPR or the Daily podcast)
8:00am- Shower
9:00am - Workout (our host a Pilates class on Instagram)
10:00am - Course work
11:00am - Virtual sessions begin
12:00pm - Lunch break/walk with Theo
2:00pm- Back to virtual sessions for the rest of the day
...I'd add in Facetimes/phone calls with friends and family daily along with watching the occasional show or video clip as well.
Structure has always given me a sense of calm and certainty in the midst of total chaos and uncertainty. So...I have a new framework for what my week days would look like...now it was time to put that in to action. The course work left me feeling invigorated and like I had new meaning and purpose. Working out daily helped me to give my body what it needed and continue to connect with my clients. Continuing to work also helped continue to be a source of feeling like I was contributing to the greater good, as well as a way to connect with some of the most important people in my life! I didn't really hadn't grasp the importance of what this moment in time was really trying to teach me until the end of last week.
Savoring "The Great Slow Down"
I am now going to call this moment in my life "The Great Slow Down". Never before have I had this level of disruption in my life (I'm sure we can pretty much all confidently say that right now). By the time I was 19 I had already moved to D.C. to begin my professional ballet career. I have not stopped since, hopping from job to job to make ends meet, until I finally landed at Equinox and was able to leave all of the other jobs behind. That didn't slow me down though, if anything it lit the fire underneath me even more. I now had a path towards a promising future with more financial stability than ever before. I applied my work ethic to building my business and ultimately to my management roles. In October of 2019 I became a Regional Pilates Manager for the company. I was thrilled!! This also meant trying to fit in new responsibilities to an already demanding schedule, while simultaneously trying to cut back and make edits where I could in my days. Something had to give...but it didn't and I continued to be happily busy.
Flash forward to two weeks ago when my workload got cut in half and I had all of this new found time. What on earth am I going to do with it all?... Thanks to the fact that I'm a hall monitor and a rule follower, I was taking this course very seriously, and that meant I was doing all of my homework and then some. So...last week I set out to focus on savoring and gratitude. I started with savoring my walks with Theo, spending more time stretching after my workouts, and taking time to enjoy my meals. These little pauses started having a profound effect and I began to realize how many little moments I was letting pass me by, by packing my schedule so tightly. My anxiety levels decreased and I was just happier. Dang it's starting to work!
An Attitude of Gratitude
Building in these pauses in my day also allowed me to appreciate all of the wonderful things in people that I have in my life. I stayed on phone conversations longer and thanked the people in my life for being in it. I also wrote in my gratitude journal nightly of all the things that I was grateful for that day. Taking time to reflect on those things brought me even more peace and understanding. I truly have it so good (to put it really simply).
Another amazing thing happens when we slow down and take the time to appreciate the awesome stuff in our lives...we actually prevent the effects of hedonic adaptation (the process of becoming accustomed to a positive or negative stimulus such that the emotional effects of that stimulus are attenuated over time).
One of the most common examples I've seen of hedonic adaptation is how we treat the people in our lives. We all know how it feels to have an immediate spark and connection with someone. It's completely exhilarating. How often does that spark wear off for you though? I bet you all would answer that as "more often than not". One of the reasons behind this is because that awesome person resets our reference point for the future. We can't live up to the expectations we place around it. We want that awesomeness to stick around though and are constantly disappointed when it doesn't bring us that same level of joy that it once did.
So what happens when people practice an attitude of gratitude for those same exact people (considering that they have not changed or wronged them)? In a study that Sonja references in her book "The How to Happiness" she tells the story of two married men. One didn't want the benefits of marriage to wear off, so they decided to never take their partner for granted and made conscious choices to show their appreciation for them (whether it was interest in their jobs or values or just made sure to spend time with them in different ways). The other man was upset that marriage didn't live up to their unrealistic expectations and was completely dissatisfied once that initial boost in happiness wore off. I know this is such a common notion but...it's not the other person disappointing you it's you!
It is fully within our power to slow down the adaptation process. Savoring moments and practicing gratitude does exactly that. It helped me look deeply at what is in front of me, and I can honestly say that I'm not going back to living a life that was too packed to realize what I have.
A look at what we're racing back to when we head back to normalcy.
Last week in our course work we were required to focus on savoring and gratitude. There were many ways to go about this, but we needed to complete one thing that we savored and at least one form of gratitude per day. At the start of quarantine, I have to admit that I was terrified about being stripped of my normal routine. It is one that is completely packed from the moment I get up until the moment I fall asleep on my couch watching whatever TV show I have on that day. I rarely got a chance to slow down and I also rarely minded that! I'm extremely passionate about what I do, and when I'm not working I do my best to connect with the people most important in my life. I make conscious efforts to set plans and reach out. I want people to know that I care about them, that they're thought of, and that they're a high priority of mine. As you can imagine this doesn't really leave much time left in my day. Even the single day I take off during the week from work was used to catch up on social activities or housework that I neglected during the week. To say that these shelter in place orders were an extreme flip of the switch for me is an understatement. Once my workload drastically changed I started to drastically restructure my days.
Coping mechanisms
That led me to one of my favorite coping mechanisms...Just. Keep. Moving. Springing in to action is something I know how to do well. I often can rely on my tenacity and endurance to push me through a difficult situation. Immediately I tried to fill my day with tasks. Luckily, I found this course to take at the recommendation of a wonderful friend. Having this as my guide post, I began designating different hours of the day to different activities. My day started to shape up like this:
7:00am- Wake up, take Theo out, feed Theo, and make breakfast (while listening to NPR or the Daily podcast)
8:00am- Shower
9:00am - Workout (our host a Pilates class on Instagram)
10:00am - Course work
11:00am - Virtual sessions begin
12:00pm - Lunch break/walk with Theo
2:00pm- Back to virtual sessions for the rest of the day
...I'd add in Facetimes/phone calls with friends and family daily along with watching the occasional show or video clip as well.
Structure has always given me a sense of calm and certainty in the midst of total chaos and uncertainty. So...I have a new framework for what my week days would look like...now it was time to put that in to action. The course work left me feeling invigorated and like I had new meaning and purpose. Working out daily helped me to give my body what it needed and continue to connect with my clients. Continuing to work also helped continue to be a source of feeling like I was contributing to the greater good, as well as a way to connect with some of the most important people in my life! I didn't really hadn't grasp the importance of what this moment in time was really trying to teach me until the end of last week.
Savoring "The Great Slow Down"
I am now going to call this moment in my life "The Great Slow Down". Never before have I had this level of disruption in my life (I'm sure we can pretty much all confidently say that right now). By the time I was 19 I had already moved to D.C. to begin my professional ballet career. I have not stopped since, hopping from job to job to make ends meet, until I finally landed at Equinox and was able to leave all of the other jobs behind. That didn't slow me down though, if anything it lit the fire underneath me even more. I now had a path towards a promising future with more financial stability than ever before. I applied my work ethic to building my business and ultimately to my management roles. In October of 2019 I became a Regional Pilates Manager for the company. I was thrilled!! This also meant trying to fit in new responsibilities to an already demanding schedule, while simultaneously trying to cut back and make edits where I could in my days. Something had to give...but it didn't and I continued to be happily busy.
Flash forward to two weeks ago when my workload got cut in half and I had all of this new found time. What on earth am I going to do with it all?... Thanks to the fact that I'm a hall monitor and a rule follower, I was taking this course very seriously, and that meant I was doing all of my homework and then some. So...last week I set out to focus on savoring and gratitude. I started with savoring my walks with Theo, spending more time stretching after my workouts, and taking time to enjoy my meals. These little pauses started having a profound effect and I began to realize how many little moments I was letting pass me by, by packing my schedule so tightly. My anxiety levels decreased and I was just happier. Dang it's starting to work!
An Attitude of Gratitude
Building in these pauses in my day also allowed me to appreciate all of the wonderful things in people that I have in my life. I stayed on phone conversations longer and thanked the people in my life for being in it. I also wrote in my gratitude journal nightly of all the things that I was grateful for that day. Taking time to reflect on those things brought me even more peace and understanding. I truly have it so good (to put it really simply).
Another amazing thing happens when we slow down and take the time to appreciate the awesome stuff in our lives...we actually prevent the effects of hedonic adaptation (the process of becoming accustomed to a positive or negative stimulus such that the emotional effects of that stimulus are attenuated over time).
One of the most common examples I've seen of hedonic adaptation is how we treat the people in our lives. We all know how it feels to have an immediate spark and connection with someone. It's completely exhilarating. How often does that spark wear off for you though? I bet you all would answer that as "more often than not". One of the reasons behind this is because that awesome person resets our reference point for the future. We can't live up to the expectations we place around it. We want that awesomeness to stick around though and are constantly disappointed when it doesn't bring us that same level of joy that it once did.
So what happens when people practice an attitude of gratitude for those same exact people (considering that they have not changed or wronged them)? In a study that Sonja references in her book "The How to Happiness" she tells the story of two married men. One didn't want the benefits of marriage to wear off, so they decided to never take their partner for granted and made conscious choices to show their appreciation for them (whether it was interest in their jobs or values or just made sure to spend time with them in different ways). The other man was upset that marriage didn't live up to their unrealistic expectations and was completely dissatisfied once that initial boost in happiness wore off. I know this is such a common notion but...it's not the other person disappointing you it's you!
It is fully within our power to slow down the adaptation process. Savoring moments and practicing gratitude does exactly that. It helped me look deeply at what is in front of me, and I can honestly say that I'm not going back to living a life that was too packed to realize what I have.
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