The world opened up again and I got sick.
I suppose it was inevitable. My second-grader went back to school with her full set of classmates and brought home a nasty cold. I caught it just in time to spend half of my Memorial Day weekend in bed while I should have been enjoying a family visit. I can’t help but wonder, could I have avoided this situation if I were being more intentional in a post-pandemic world?
Being Intentional in a Post-Pandemic World
Way back at the beginning of the pandemic, I wrote a three-part series about using COVID-19 to simplify your life for good. The premise was simple. You’ve already taken everything out of your schedule that used to take up your time. Now that everything is opening back up and you’ve been vaccinated, only add back the things that truly make you happy or help you move towards your goals.
Now that everything is opening back up and you’ve been vaccinated, only add back the things that truly make you happy or help you move towards your goals.
That advice is proving far more difficult to follow than to dole out. Businesses who had promised to stay remote, are now calling all of their employees back to the office. Friends want to get out and see each other in person. Kids’ activities are starting up again. All of this is causing our schedules to fill up to pre-pandemic status — and beyond. At the moment, I think I only have 2-3 free weekends this summer and there are activities already vying for those last, precious slots.
Stress Levels Return As We Return
Most of the knowledge-workers of the world are back onto some sort of hybrid schedule. I have really enjoyed seeing everyone at work on a regular cadence now, but wow! has my stress level increased on days when I have to go into the office. It’s not even close. The commute, my kids’ bus schedules, and the need to make lunch or other plans for the day, seems to add a tremendous amount of time to my schedule. While I enjoyed a six o’clock wake-up time during the pandemic and still got my workout in and everyone off to (virtual) school and work, I now find myself setting the alarm for 4:55am just to get the same things done.
It’s not just the extra time and planning a commute takes either. At home, I could fit in little errands, chores, etc over lunch or during a quick mental recharge break in between meetings. I found time over lunch to walk, to nap, to just clear my plate so I could better focus on the task at hand.
Am I a better employee because I’m in a physical office? Certainly not. I’m more productive by a long-shot from home. I’m more productive at my day job and I’m more productive in the rest of my life too.
But, am I a happier employee? I think so. I’ve missed that community of people at work and seeing them face-to-face is filling a void that’s been opened up over the last year. Could I get the same satisfaction from going in once a week vs 2-3 times a week? Probably.
So how is this connected to me being sick? My current illness has been three times more intense than the one my daughter got. It’s the same bug, but it’s hitting a different person. A person who is carrying the stress of setting up multiple schedules. Someone who was preparing for a weekend in which her entire family came to town and stayed at her house. One who had to struggle with a massive telephone carrier filtering issue at work the day before a long weekend.
Intentionality & Simplification is Essential
And so I’m almost writing this more for myself that anyone else reading it. Being intentional in a post-pandemic world about what you put back into your calendar is essential. It’s essential for your health, it’s essential for your future self. It’s essential to drive away the cruft that’s not worth doing so you can focus on what really matters to you.
And it’s not easy. It’s not easy to think about what you really want to add back into your life and just do that. Pick up one thing at a time. Start things slowly and end them quickly if they’re not working. Be intentional.
I just told a friend of mine that we should skip an upcoming weekend together with our kids in favor of an adults-only beach weekend we were already planning a month later. While I truly can’t wait to see her, it’s more important — for both of us, I suspect — to get together on our own terms and enjoy each other in a much more serene and cocktail-appropriate setting. To her credit, she immediately understood and that’s what we’ll do. We’ll be intentional with our time and make the things we do truly matter.
