West Indies Salad

Today I Don't Feel Like Doing Anything

Today I don't feel like doing anything.

Not in a dramatic way. Not in a cancel-my-plans-and-pull-the-covers-over-my-head kind of way. I simply don't feel like being productive.

The trouble is that admitting that out loud feels almost rebellious.

We live in a world obsessed with motion. Everywhere we look, someone is building something, launching something, improving something, optimizing something. There is always another list to make, another goal to reach, another email to answer. Productivity has become a virtue, and busyness has become a status symbol.

Meanwhile, I am sitting here looking at a perfectly ordinary day with no desire to conquer it.

For years, I would have seen that as a character flaw.

I would have called it laziness.

I would have convinced myself I needed to push harder, try harder, accomplish more. The answer was always movement. If I felt tired, work harder. If I felt overwhelmed, work harder. If I felt lost, work harder.

The problem with that philosophy is that eventually life collects its payment.

As someone who has struggled with depression, I have spent a good portion of my life negotiating with energy. Some mornings it arrives before I do. Other mornings it never quite shows up at all. What I've learned is that exhaustion is not always physical. Sometimes it settles into your bones. Sometimes it disguises itself as apathy. Sometimes it simply asks you to be still for a while.

Yet even then, guilt has a way of finding a seat at the table.

There have been countless afternoons when I have done nothing more ambitious than sit quietly and watch the light move across a room while mentally composing a list of everything I should have accomplished instead. The irony is almost funny. We exhaust ourselves, then criticize ourselves for needing rest. We run on empty, then feel guilty for stopping to refill the tank.

Imagine treating a friend the way most of us treat ourselves.

Imagine your daughter calling to tell you she's exhausted. Imagine your best friend confessing she's overwhelmed. Imagine someone you love admitting they simply don't have much left to give today.

You wouldn't hand them a to-do list.

You wouldn't tell them to try harder.

You certainly wouldn't suggest that their worth was somehow tied to how much they accomplished before bedtime.

You would offer grace.

You would remind them to take care of themselves.

You would tell them that rest is not a reward. It's a necessity.

For some reason, that compassion comes easily when it is directed toward other people and almost never when it is directed toward ourselves.

The older I get, the more convinced I become that self-care has terrible public relations. We imagine it arrives wrapped in luxury when, more often than not, it looks like declining an invitation, leaving the dishes until morning, taking a nap, or allowing an entire afternoon to exist without demanding that it justify itself.

The oxygen-mask speech flight attendants give before takeoff has survived for a reason.

Put your own mask on first.

Not because you matter more than everyone else.

Because you cannot help anyone if you cannot breathe.

The truth is that the people who love us need a healthy version of us far more than they need an exhausted one. The world does not benefit when we run ourselves into the ground. Our families do not benefit. Our friendships do not benefit. We certainly do not benefit.

Today I don't feel like doing anything.

Years ago, I would have fought that feeling. I would have tried to outrun it. I would have spent the day proving my usefulness to myself.

Today, I'm trying something different.

Today, I am giving myself permission to be human.

The laundry will wait.

The emails will wait.

Tomorrow will arrive whether I earn it or not.

For most of my life, I thought rest was something you had to deserve.

Now I think it may be one of the reasons we survive.