Sunday I was very productive. Well, I did a bunch elsewhere—the work boom didn’t make it here. At the end of the last day of the weekend, when I was just a couple of hours from slumber, I began this post.
And honestly, I almost didn’t do that.
After the last week’s worth of low energy and mood swings, it seemed a little too good to be true that I was able to get a bunch done. Of course, much of it was a brand new project. That may have skewed results. Now I’m looking at all that effort that felt well-spent and worrying: did I do too much?
And more importantly: will it affect my productivity for the rest of the week?
Long ago, before I’d found Medium and Substack, intensely productive days were bad omens. Especially if they were at the start of the week. Sunday and Monday were good for setting up plans for the week or finalizing tasks from the week prior. If I made the plan and executed it completely before the week even started, I basically expected to run out of steam by Wednesday.
Sometimes Tuesday. By Friday, I might recover enough to salvage the bare minimums if I was lucky.
Some Of Us Work Differently
If you’re like me, you probably aren’t very good at being consistent. Bursts of productivity are easy—directing them toward a specific task is not. That probably spells ADHD, but I’m no expert. What I do know is that it’s difficult to get anything done when the cycle gets wonky like this.
It’s not always this way. Sometimes the waves are peaceful, like a beachside vacation. When I can tame those inner seas, life is pretty nice. Stressful at times, but nice.
Calming the waves is like balancing two plates of jello on one arm—doable, but not the easiest thing to clean up after a tumble. Working too hard, getting overwhelmed, and doing too much are all textbook ways to make it all come crashing down.
Basically, the more I try to do, the less I actually get done.
Giving Up Has Helped; But Maybe There’s Something Better
You read that right. Giving up has been a game changer for me. It’s not as dramatic as it sounds, though. The way I “give up” is pretty simple: I let go of all the plans, hopes, and expectations I had for the future.
Don’t burn the bridges, though. That’s the rule now: giving up is a mindset, not an activity. In the moment, I let go of all responsibility to all the projects I’ve accumulated and just sit with myself for awhile to rebuild myself in the moment. And, over hours or days I’ll rebuild my plans and hopes for the future.
If a project doesn’t make the cut, that’s ok. I can close it out purposefully—often, I’ll find a few years later my interest will pick up again. So it’s become a habit to find ways to temporarily close things with the possibility of coming back.
However, that technique has its limitations (as I’m sure you can speculate). That’s why I’m in the market for some new tactics to make this recovery (and hopefully future fallouts) much easier to weather.
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