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Daily Capacity

Cedar Sanderson
2–3 minutes
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When coffee is not enough, then what?

This year, man. This year. The upside is that the medical event looming over my husband and by extension, me, is past and went better than anyone expected. The downside is that the stress over the last couple of months has done things to me that I’m struggling to cope with.

There’s only so much coffee I can consume before my heart starts turning somersaults and that’s really uncomfortable. So. What to do when the brain fog isn’t lifting? Well, there’s also only so much sleeping can be done. And only so much brain candy reading. And…

You get the idea, I think. Right at the moment I’m pantsing an essay. When I’ve put a finish to this I’m going to the studio to cut and mat some paintings because I have a show in a few hours and I’ve been too out of it to prep for that. Writing… maybe tomorrow? Maybe tonight if I’m not too worn out from the event today. Maybe Monday.

In the run-up to the medical adventures, one of the things that came up was ‘can’t put this on plastic, there’s a daily withdrawal amount.’ Which was fun, because that meant a very large cash transaction, large enough I thought the bank might hassle us because government overreach. Ahem. Anyway. It’s been on my mind, and I’ve come to realize that my body has a daily withdrawal amount, too. Can’t call and have the bank (brain?) adjust it upwards, can I? Well, I can. Sort of. For a while. If I exercise, to bleed off cortisol, and eat well, and do the things like drinking the water (and not too much coffee) and sleeping enough, then I can endure more. At some point, though, you just max it all out and you’re overdrawn and the body keeps score. The brain kicks a fit, and suddenly you are down, hard, for a rest in the most uncomfortable possible way. I don’t recommend this. I really don’t. Unfortunately, I also can’t say ‘oh, do this…’ because reader, I thought I was doing the right things.

There is only so much stress you can remove from your life. Sometimes there are things you just can’t get away from. Taking care of your family, of work, of the house… all those must come out as withdrawals on your daily capacity. When you don’t have enough in your banked energy to supply these, what do you do?

Seriously. I feel like I’m drowning, here.

11 responses to “Daily Capacity”

  1. TXRed Avatar
    TXRed

    Since burrowing into the ground and hiding isn’t an option, I find a way to set aside time to be numb. I know that everything will catch up with me at some point. I also know that there are spaces in the calendar that give me a moment without Day Job, so I can curl up and shake (metaphorically speaking).

    Physically? No idea. I go until I get sick, which is my body’s way of saying “Ahem, chill.” Right now I’m grumbling because I can’t do All The Things because of stitches. They will come out, but I still need to go slow and carefully. I do NOT like this. I probably need this. Which is no help for you, or people who don’t have a (temporary) physical reason to slow down.

    Reply
  2. Jane Meyerhofer Avatar
    Jane Meyerhofer

    “Not indolence, nor pleasure, nor the fret 

       Of restless passions that would not be stilled, 

       But sorrow, and a care that almost killed, 

       Kept me from what I may accomplish yet…”

    Mezzo Cammin Longfellow

    I doubt if it’s helpful to say this is the human condition, but it is.

    Reply
  3. jaglionpress Avatar
    jaglionpress

    Echoing Red, I think it’s okay to let the creative stuff lie fallow for a while. Right now, you’ve been dealing with other commitments, like your father’s passing and the garden, in addition to your husband’s health. It’s important to have faith that the words will come back when there is space for them.

    Reply
  4. Pam Uphoff Avatar
    Pam Uphoff

    Sometimes you have to accept that the creativity isn’t going to happen for a while.

    Maybe you can catch up on business, or organizing . . . but sometimes you need to do the minimum (kind of hard when you need the money!) so body and soul can recharge.

    Remember that it will come back, probably supercharged.

    Reply
  5. Dorothy Grant Avatar
    Dorothy Grant

    One of the hardest parts of working for yourself is remembering that you shouldn’t be the toxic kind of boss you’d flee from if it were anyone else. “My boss is an asshole but he lets me drink on the job” is a funny meme, and an absolutely terrible way to run a business.

    Would you work a job for a giant soulless corporation where the boss demanded you show up and be creative every single day, with no weekend days off for years? Where they demanded you come in and work when your husband’s having major surgery? Where there were no sick days, no vacation, ever?

    Don’t let yourself be the boss you hate. Or as Jordan Peterson puts it, “Treat yourself like someone you are responsible for helping.”

    So the first thing you ought to do is look around and triage. What can be delegated to someone else? Delegate it. No, don’t beat yourself up for “dumping it in their lap unexpectedly”… they saw this coming a mile off. You’ve probably already done it for them already. Let them return the favour! Nobody should be a single point of failure, and maybe now is the time to stress-test that and encourage workarounds by… NOT BEING THERE.

    Second, what of your own can’t delegate work can be scheduled for later? Scheduling is important – you’re not “shoving it aside” or “putting it off” and then feeling the impending doom of a mountain of ignored things… you’re scheduling it, and saying “I can lay this burden down, until this date.”

    Third, what can just flat be dropped? No one expects you to have a clean house when you or your husband is sick, and you shouldn’t either. I’m currently on a course of Augmentin, and guess who isn’t even bothering in one iota about the diet? Just getting and keeping food down is the challenge right now… I am not going to waste mental energy I don’t have trying to beat myself up. I’m just going to have pineapple upside down cake.

    …

    You were doing the right things, with exercising, eating, sunshine, hydration… but you still need to rest. The meat suit demands hours in unconscious repair mode every single day, and G-d Himself stated and set as an example that even when you’re a stone-into-bronze age tribe living on the ragged edge of survival, you need to take one day off a week and rest.

    So Fourth, pull out that calendar you just rescheduled your tasks on, and take a red marker, and start picking two days a week (because you need healing time. One day is great when you’re doing well. Two is necessary for building back up) and writing in thick red sharpie REST to block out the day for nothing else.

    Resting won’t be easy. You’re not used to it. It means you have to spend time alone with your thoughts instead of drowning them in distraction. Meditation will often, for me, result in a 45-line set of all the small tasks I’d been putting off or forgotten to do.

    But it’s not a bad idea at all to shut down the computer so you can’t sit down for “just a moment” and try to do “just this one thing”, turn off the phone so you don’t start distracting yourself with doomscrolling and chats, and just let your brain and body rest.

    And fifth, once you’ve rested enough to physically and mentally recover, go do something out of your normal just for fun. Why yes, yes, you now know exactly why I’ve stolen you away for a road trip to see dinosaurs or painting pottery. Because it has nothing at all to do with my normal demands of Day Job or of creativity… since you have functional lungs and knees, I’ll recommend hiking.

    Reply
  6. Foxfier Avatar
    Foxfier

    I’m not good at it, but “look for any small annoyances that can be removed” helps some. Even if it’s literally “dump in a box and shove under the bed” rather than sorting the clothes that are probably going to be downsized.

    Mental permission to throw away stuff that “might be useful” but probably won’t– like Nice Boxes.

    Reply
    1. quicklyglorious238a1a5ba8 Avatar
      quicklyglorious238a1a5ba8

      That’s huge.

      Reply
  7. quicklyglorious238a1a5ba8 Avatar
    quicklyglorious238a1a5ba8

    Curl up in my corner and doomscroll. Don’t recommend that. I wish I could help.

    Reply
  8. quicklyglorious238a1a5ba8 Avatar
    quicklyglorious238a1a5ba8

    Curl up in my corner and doomscroll. Don’t recommend that. I wish I could help.

    Reply
  9. crossovercreativechaos Avatar
    crossovercreativechaos

    I literally can’t remember the last time I had a day off that I wasn’t flat on my bed sick. Ugh.

    Reply
  10. Ben Yalow Avatar
    Ben Yalow

    For me, it’s a dual process.

    The first step is triage. Does this need to be done now (No-postpone to a specific time) or at all(No=drop)?

    And then find distracting comfort stuff. In my case, watching the NY Mets/NY Rangers (depending on season, and when they have a game) — They’ve both got great announcers who teach you a lot and make you think — but it’s not mandatory stuff to be thinking about. Or comfort reads — I’ve got a good list of books which are just so much fun, and impressive, to reread — so I do. Some are genre — but I also have others that I read when I decide I hate SF (I start outside the genre, then comfort reads until I decide to get back to SF).

    I don’t know if that’ll work for you, but it’s my scheme.

    Reply

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