2020 has been a difficult year; which may be the understatement of the decade.
But what's been even more challenging is the unintended consequences of our decisions. There's so much weight associated with each action because there's so much unknown.
Imagine a choice in front of you: go left or go right. If you knew that by going left you'd face alligators and by going right you'd face murder hornets...at least you are informed. And you could be prepared. Even if both decisions lead to dangerous endpoints, you would be ready.
But 2020 has been about making decisions with only bits of information and then getting hammered by the unforeseen dangers further down the path. We don't know what is waiting for us at the end of the right path nor the left. Yet we have to decide and oftentimes, quickly.
Take Covid-19. Because Marly is immune-compromised, we decided to have Colin attend virtual school. We knew it would be challenging...but we didn't foresee just how hard it would be. Look, this is no knock against teachers, they are doing their absolute best, however, we didn't realize how involved we were going to be day-to-day.
For the most part, Colin is being asked to be a self-guided learner; an unintended consequence of our decision. We are his teachers, literally watching videos with him...books on our laps...and grinding it out together. We're his friends. We're his counselors for the hard days; for the days when the random kid tells him things like "you can't hang out with us because you're afraid of Covid!" Or "Ooooh, where's your mask? Now you're going to get sick!" Unintended weight that he has to bear because of our decisions.
By the way...to those parents...thank you. Thank you for letting your kids hear you and then parrot your own idiotic views and making a child bear more burdens than we've already asked of him. Outstanding parenting by you. You should feel proud. And I can't thank you enough for adding to his burden.
I digress, but not really...because this year has been all about unintended weight. Unintended weight like not being able to see my grandmother again before she passed.
I'm an over-thinker by nature and when I'm caught flat-footed, it eats at me. But this year? It's been so hard to predict all of the consequences of the decisions; it's been so challenging to try and navigate all of the possibilities. It's been exhausting.
As the year has dragged on, my wife has noticed the accumulation of that weight on my shoulders and encouraged me (well, really it was cruel and unusual threatening...she withheld my scotch until I agreed) to get out of town for a few days for some R&R.
And so, I went off to a small farm just outside of Columbia Missouri. I hiked in the woods, watched the moon rise and sat by a fire. Alone. In the quiet. With no decisions to be made.
I'd love to say I'm fully recovered and rested. I'm not. But I needed it and it was a great step forward.
Self-care and mental/emotional health are so vastly under-appreciated. In fact, lots of internet "tough guys" are quick to call you a snowflake if you dare talk about mental health. So absurd.
But what I really got out of the adventure was a chance to quiet some of the outside noise. To do some real thinking. To sort through all of the unintended consequences we've had to navigate and come to grips with them.
That's been the other challenge: no time to reconcile. It's been rapid fire decision after rapid fire decision with no time to process the impacts. It helped me find some peace with my decisions and I jotted down a lot of new content ideas that I'm excited to put together. I've missed writing and I think getting away helped clear some of the writer's block!
I'd encourage you to find your own oasis, your own downtime to process. It's been a rapid-fire year with little time to reflect. But we need to make the time for ourselves and for those that depend on us to navigate the crazy-times we're in with them.
For me, I'm fortunate that I have a spouse that not only recognized I was burning out...but then encouraged me to do something about it. So, let me do the same for you...if you're hanging on by a thread, make some time for yourself. It's important and you're worth it.
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