Recently I wrote about the importance of self-care and since I had so many replies about this topic, I thought I would share what I learned when I found my own personal regime being tested in a way I’m not used to. Because I love a schedule (I’m an upholder afterall) and my life generally allows me to focus on me, carving out time for self-care isn’t usually a problem.
However, when working on project that became larger than anticipated, my normally highly organised days were challenged by late nights and tight deadlines. I'm happy to say I survived and gained some insights along the way.
Sleep matters to me
Since childhood, I’ve always needed a lot of sleep. So while the average adult is recommended to get 7 to 9 hours per night, less than 9 is tough on me and really, I am better if I get 10.
While working on this project, though, I was existing on 5 or 6 hours per night. This was a combination of being up too late and getting up earlier than normal. During this period of intensity, I generally got up with my alarm and worked productively late into the evening, even though I am a committed morning person. So my mind concluded that I was coping just fine on lack of sleep, thank you very much.
But my body was telling me something else. After just 3 days, my ability to get through a conversation without losing the point of what I was saying was challenged. Every item I needed to do had to be written down. I could no longer maintain mental lists of tasks and errands. Something I'm usually quite adept at. And when I found myself falling asleep at 8:30 pm one night, I knew the shut eye I had missed was catching up with me.
Previously, I would have ignored the messages from my body and yielded instead to my mind’s desire to finish a job at all costs. Now I understand that the mind isn’t always best placed to make the right call. Sometimes it needs to be a joint decision between mind and body.
Monkey mind
I still haven’t mastered a daily meditation routine, however I am generally good at quieting my mind and staying focused on one task. During times of intensity, though, this becomes significantly harder for me.
During this stressful stretch, I noticed this most often when I was travelling on public transport. Normally, podcasts are my best friend to help me speed through this time, but with so much to think about, I found my mind wandering. I’d suddenly be 5 or 15 minutes in and have no idea what had just been said.
Not wanting to do multiple listens to each episode, when I realised this, I switched my commuting headphone sound over to music. I could choose something soothing or something with get up and go, letting my mind wander freely without worrying about missing something important on Forever 35. Sure, I wasn’t having shower-level inspiration, but matching music to mood certainly helped my state of mind.
Talk it out
For as much as I might have been powering through what I needed to do, there were definitely times when I wasn’t feeling at the top of my game. In my previous corporate life, I never would have admitted this. To anyone, least of all myself. With a few more years under my belt though, I now recognise that sometimes we can’t do it all and we need to say so.
So when I felt a bit shaky before a meeting, I made a surprising move by asking the person I was going with to help me keep an eye on myself and to give me a nudge if I lost the plot. Just speaking the words out loud helped to lessen the burden, recognise my stress and appreciate that I would need to work a bit harder to communicate effectively. And then to know I had someone watching my back was just what I needed.
Wake up and smell the routine
While the project played havoc with my schedule, I tried to keep up with as much of my routine as I can and to revel in it, even if my allocated time was shortened from normal. Cleansing my face in the morning and evening, a daily workout, a little bit of yoga at the end of the day have all been activities I’ve maintained. They haven’t always been easy to fit in, but I know they help keep me grounded, which is always important when life feels a bit out of control.
I wish I could say I also covered myself in sheet masks to cope, but I just didn’t have the time. I wasn’t reading as much either because sometimes I needed mindless tv, rather than the required concentration of a book. But that’s just temporary, reading remains a well-loved past-time.
What are you doing to cope with stress in your life right now?