“I’m Not Who I Want to Be Right Now”: Coming to Terms with Life when it’s Life-ing

I was having a conversation with a friend of mine (let’s call her Jane) the other day. She has a very young toddler and she works full time from home. Jane was telling me how she started working out at 5 am before her toddler wakes up. She was asking me what she should do because she is bonked by 11 am.

Like can barely keep her eyes open, feels like walking through mud… caffeine wasn’t helping at all.

Jane prides herself on pushing herself hard AF in her workouts. Prior to having a kid, she was a complete and total gym rat. It’s a place she feels comfortable and holds a lot of her identity.

She was looking for “the trick” or “the secret” to pull off these workouts while working from home with a toddler.

What I told her… was not what she wanted to hear.

Each and every one of us has our own unique threshold for stress. This is impacted by many many factors including trauma, upbringing, access to resources, genetics, etc.

The positive stress of a workout is still stress. The positive stress of a toddler is still stress. Those two things were pushing her over her threshold for stress.

That didn’t even include the stress from work, daily life, weather delays, family stress, friend drama, or whatever else was going on in her life.

At some point, we have to accept where our threshold is and honor it like a boundary. Because once we go below that threshold, it can be real hard to come back up.

Jane was bummed. This is not what she wanted to hear. She was really hoping I’d have a “Time Saving Hack” or a “Supplement That Gives You Zing!” to send her to. Jane wanted to optimize her life and keep rolling.

Sometimes when we’re going through a big change: a young child, a new job, starting graduate school, the loss of a family member, or a move we have to create space to process our grief.

Our grief around the version of ourselves that we didn’t get to pick this time.

Our grief around not being able to show up 100% in all facets of our lives.

Making a choice means making a thousand other choices.

By that I mean, when I choose to eat Thai food for dinner, I am also choosing to not eat pizza, choosing to not eat hamburgers, choosing to not eat sushi and so on.

There’s a part of us (if you’re a high-achiever or perfectionist especially) that doesn’t want to have to make that choice. That wants to compartmentalize. Yeah so I started graduate school but I can still push it in the gym and show up for my friends 100% and be the one who hosts family functions and be on the community garden board and and and and…

But that has its limits and that limit is usually burnout. Or illness and injury. Or letting people down because your partner wants more than 15% of your time.

When we feel that sadness and impatience, that drive to DO ALL THE THINGS, what if we made space for grief instead?

What if processing our grief and letting it fall like ashes fertilized the soil for this chapter of who we are?

What if it's okay to make an imperfect choice and be a human navigating that?

In talking to Jane, I offered another perspective. One of acceptance. One of honoring what she needs to feel supported right now. Not who she wishes she could be.

What if we just accept that this is where she’s at right now? Let’s honor that threshold instead of pushing it. She thought about it and agreed. It’s not who she wants to be right now. And that’s okay. But it’s just for now.